11-16-2024 10:16am

Eastern Screech Owl (Megascops asio)

Beth Callahan Editor

Nature Close to Home and Ohio Certified Volunteer Naturalist Dave Woehr shares monthly naturalist stories.

LEBANON, OH -- The Screech Owl is the most common of Ohio’s owls. It is also one of the smallest, being roughly the size of a stout, fluffy Cardinal. It is famous for its spooky vocalizations some of which might send shivers up your spine. Screech owls come in two color phases, gray and red, the red actually being more of a rusty brown. Their plumage is mottled making it very difficult to spot one when it is roosting against a tree trunk or huddled in a shallow wooden cavity, and “ear tufts” can be raised and lowered at will.

Screech Owls live about everywhere here in Ohio. They inhabit city parks, woodlots, brushy thickets, abandoned farms, residential neighborhoods with mature trees, and riparian forestland. They seldom move during the day, reserving the darkness of night for their feeding activity. Their diet includes small mammals, insects, birds, and worms.

Screech Owls are cavity nesters. Nesting may occur anytime between March and July. There is just one brood produced each year. Natural tree hollows or abandoned woodpecker nest sites are favorite spots for a female Screech Owl to incubate her clutch of four to six white eggs which she lays on the floor of the cavity without adding any insulating material. Nest boxes are also acceptable sites for Screech Owl use. Miller Ecological Park had Screech Owls using nest boxes that were intended to attract Kestrels (a small falcon). The female owl’s mate brings food to her while she remains on the nest. Eggs hatch about a month after being laid, and the young owlets fledge after about another month.

Despite being our most prevalent owl species they are so reclusive that until this week I had never seen one in the wild. As I passed a tree along the narrow country road I was driving on I noticed a cavity that may have been either natural or perhaps chiseled into the trunk by a woodpecker. Something about that cavity caught my interest, so I backed the car up for a closer look. Lo and behold a nicely camouflaged Screech Owl was facing outward appearing to be taking a nap with the warm sun on its face.