Alice the Great Horned Owl is a permanently injured owl who works at the Houston Nature Center in Houston, MN and lives with her handler, Karla Bloem. Rusty and Iris are Great Horned Owls that are both blind in their right eyes and cannot live in the wild. Rusty and Iris are breeding in captivity as part of Karla's vocal study on Great Horned Owls. All together they have led to the creation of an International Owl Center in Houston, MN and an International Festival of Owls.
Wednesday, May 29, 2013
Tuesday, May 28, 2013
Sunday, May 26, 2013
Owlet Enrichment
The owlets, at about 10 weeks of age, are at a stage similar to human toddlers...they're into everything, exploring every aspect of their environment. They are working on depth perception, eye-foot coordination, flying, carrying things, and more.
To help with their development, I've added a variety of toys for their enrichment, and they have been using ALL of them! In the first part of this video an owlet drags a stuffed bear onto the floor and drags it a bit. The Patrick (I think) makes a big haul: he got the large piece of purple fabric untied from the hatch perch in the flight pen and hauled it over to the nest!
Not to be so easily satisfied, after a rest he went and got the giggle ball from the floor and hauled it up to the nest platform too.
I have now added an empty box to the breeding pen, so I'm curious to see what they'll do with it. Alice loves to check out boxes and tight spaces.
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