Great Horned Owl Release at Tri-State Bird Rescue

So there is certainly more coming about my two weeks at Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research, but during the first of my two weeks there, I got a chance to help out and take photos of the release of one of our birds, a Great Horned Owl.  This guy had been with us for a few months; he had been found sick and unable to fly in the early spring.  He's had a very slow recovery; for a while they were unsure if he was going to make it.  He started out indoors in a small cage where he could be monitored closely twice a day and was then moved outside into a larger cage.  The last step before release is to be moved into one of the flight cages, a much bigger cage with room for the large birds to actually fly and to make sure that he can catch live prey.  Finally, it was finally deemed time to be released! 

After contacting the people that found him (most adult birds are returned to their home environment so that everything is familiar when they are released) and arranging a time to bring him out, the next steps were to catch him out of his flight cage (easier said than done), band him (for identification purposes in case he is ever caught again), and drive him out to his home to let him loose!

First, here's a few pictures of this handsome fellow in his flight cage!














We started with a box, a towel, some raptor gloves, and two nets.  Once the birds are healthy, it's a lot harder to catch them than it was when they first arrive, sick and unable to fly, especially since this guy was smart enough to hang from the ceiling out of reach of our nets.


















Finally we got a hold of him and gently was able to move him out of the net and into a towel and then a box, careful to avoid his sharp talons and beak!


























 Next we brought him inside to band him.  Banding is a federally regulated process, so that birds can be identified no matter where they are found in the USA.  The bird's leg is carefully measured to find the right sized band, and then put on carefully and filed down to get rid of any sharp points.

Then he was ready to go!  His home was about a half hour away, so he was loaded back into his box and driven to the farm where he had been found a few months before.  Despite the fact that he hadn't been there for months and had not been free to fly any great distance for that whole time, he didn't miss a beat.  The box was gently tipped over, opened, and out he came!  His feet didn't even touch the ground- he just took off into the trees on the other side of the property!

It was really beautiful to see; he was a gorgeous bird that needed months of care and rehab to be released, but watching him fly away certainly makes all of that worthwhile! 


Next up, a more complete description of my rotation at Tri-State!