Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Barred Owl

We've got barred owls like crazy in my neighborhood. They are impressive birds. Sometimes, at night, I see them sitting on the phone lines above me as I walk by. I've witnessed one kill a rat on someone's lawn. Swooped down from a tree and grabbed it while it was running across the lawn.

I see a lot of Barred Owls out in the fields in NC. There is one that I see regularly. It literally flies down and watches me on one particular trail I travel. Once I get a little ways away, it hops from tree to tree follwoing me. Not sure that that's about.



There's a young one started to exhibit the same behavior.



One time I came acorss a bear sitting in field. It looked like he was having a conversation with two Great Horned Owls. They were just sitting there, not paying much attention to me.





I think the bear just wanted to know how many licks it takes to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop.

Really cool animal. They make a racket when I'm over in bluff country hunting turkeys. My friend has a cabin over there and he can call em in right to his deck. It's cool to watch.

Owls are cool, we have a pair we hear all the time..

I had one perch near my archery stand years ago. Pretty regular visitor.

Never seen one here on the Bay... just Osprey, Balds and hawks. Osprey on fish is neat to watch. Balds are over-rated.

I was in California running a harvester and every orchard would have a barn owl in it, pretty neat.

we had a young rabbit living under our gazebo.

He is no longer there, I'm guessing when I saw that owl in the yard, he was picking it up

I have about 8 - 10 squirrels. He'll be going after them.

Beautiful animal though

If you know how to cook owls, they taste just like eagles.

We hear them just about every night. I think mice and rats are their main prey. We have a ton of rabbits so don't think they regularly go after the adults. Since we got an outside cat hanging around the house reducing the mice population we don't hear the owls near the house as often.

We sit on our front porch most nights and enjoy their calls. Seems there are at least 3 nearby, one flew to a oak tree by the house and when he let go with his call it was crazy louddddddddd.

took a class on owls found in PA at the local state park, was told Barred Owls like swampy area and frogs,etc..

In both instances they were maybe waiting for you[and the bear] to get some smaller critter stirring?

From treestands I see mostly barred and horned owls[dusk & dawn].
Love watching them gaze over open fields at the woods edge.
Hear both screech and barred most every evening from our porch.

A barn owl took up residence in our house during construction. We had to shoo it out the day the windows/doors were installed.

Barred owls are famously docile in captivity, great horned owls OTOH are just vile, so they say.

There's a reason owls suddenly appear at your home.

Takes about 5 seconds of research to find the meaning.

Shoot that SOB while you still can.

Naah, they’ve been trying to take me out for decades.

‘Course, they eventually get it right in the end.

Neat creatures.

I don't mind them in the woods. If they start wandering around near the Martin houses....

I heard that great horned owls will kill up to 20 pheasants a week but only eat a couple. They're honing their hunting skills. I did witness one that picked up and dropped a hen dozens of times down a road ditch. Fascinating stuff. He'd snatch it up just before it hit the ground.

Download The Merlin App. It’s free and you can identify birds with pics taken from your phone or sounds they make while hitting the record button while using the app. We were talking to about a half dozen Barred Owls at the cabin a few weeks ago. I also called in some Pileated woodpeckers that were in the woods nearby. Awesome app!