Listen for Owls Singing on Warm Autumn Nights

What was that? Yes, there it is again, outside my window at four in the morning, "calling my name." When you lie awake in the middle of the night, thinking troubled thoughts, it is comforting to imagine that a singing owl is calling your name. Birds don't only sing in the spring. They have to practice sometime. It takes more than raw talent to attract and bond with a mate and warn off competitors. For some species there is a more immediate purpose as well, establishing a winter-feeding boundary with a neighbor. Food can be hard to find in the cold and snow.

On these warm days in fall the Mockingbird is warming up his chords in the back yard. He definitely needs to hoard a food supply of berry bushes to last him until spring, when he regales us with a full-fledged song. The sparrows that come to the feeder often sing their "whisper song" early on frosty mornings, a soft serenade at first light. It is a gentle version of the full spring song, as if the bird is reminiscing about lost love.

On this night the owl sends forth a whistling tremolo in two versions, one low and even pitched, the other higher and descending. For some reason this song gave the bird the name screech owl, but it is more like a forlorn wail than a screech. The sweet notes are hardly enough to strike terror in the heart. There is an owl that screeches, the barn owl, but you have to go south and west to find that species.

The screech owl is small and either gray or red, with tufts on its head which are not the ears. They like to eat mice, but they will take a small bird whose night roost is not well hidden. This accounts for the turnabout when a flock of songbirds scolds and bothers a roosting owl during the daylight. If you can imitate the owl song, small birds will often come close to check you out.

It was the second time this owl was heard calling recently. The first time was during the full moon a couple of weeks earlier. Then it was loud and persistent, prompting me to rise and step outside. There the bright moon was hovering well above the ridge and the hayfield behind the house was shimmering with soft light. The song still filled the air - but wait a minute - what was that? I listened carefully. Ah, there it was again, from the woods beyond the field the deep and truly menacing boom of the great horned owl. Now there was a bird to strike fear, a big bird, voracious and skilled at hunting. A bird that could capture and devour the screech owl.

He was not alone. There was the higher pitched call of his lady friend, starting her notes before the male finished his, and trailing off after he was done. It was a bonding duet, anticipating the full mating process that starts in December. This is a predator that knows how to find food in winter and so can begin to nest then. They don't build their own nest, however. Usually they borrow or steal a hawk nest. Sometimes they borrow the nest of a great blue heron, where they can be found sitting in February above an open marsh with eggs or small young. By the time the ice melts and the heron returns from the south, the owl has enticed its full sized young to the deeper woods.

The screech owl nests in a tree cavity, or a box that is erected at the edge of a field. Last winter one sunned himself for several days in the entrance to the nesting box near the house. Your best chance of seeing this adorable owl in daylight is to find one like this in a southward facing tree hole. You have to look carefully, because the gray feathers are great camouflage against the bark, the red feathers less so. Those sleepy yellow eyes may give the bird away if you get close enough to rouse it and receive its gaze.

Listen and look and you may find - the owl calling your name or staring you down.