Recently I had the gratifying opportunity to rescue this beautiful Barred Owl. Evidently, there must have been a squirrel or lizard climbing on a pool screen and in the owl's attempt to catch an easy meal, it's sharp talons cut through the screen and the owl ended up inside the screened pool enclosure. The resident found the owl early in the morning and opened both screen doors and attempted to encourage the owl to fly out, however, instead the owl flew around the enclosure all day until it got so weak that it couldn't fly anymore. As nighttime approached, the resident called me (around 6pm) and when I arrived, the owl was lying on it's side and we thought that it was dead. As we approached the owl, it stood up. I quickly put a towel over it in order to pick it up safely. After taking a couple of pictures, I took the owl outside and threw it up in the air and it flew to a nearby tree.

Barred Owls lay 2-4 eggs and can live 10 years in the wild and up to 23 years in captivity. The next time that you hear an owl hooting, listen closely to see if you can hear it saying, "who cooks for you; who cooks for you all".