Tawny Owl eating oak leaves

Our first rehabbed owl, Owly, shown about an hour after his release in July 2003, appearing to tuck into some oak leaves. Apologies for the inane commentary -- we'd been filming for some time and most of the time he was doing . . well, nothing very much at all. He was just over 3 months old at the time.
This should be compared with the movie of Stripey the Great Horned Owl eating grapes, also on my channel. You could say that for carnivores these owls sometimes consume some very strange things. All three young tawnies I've looked after have enjoyed and even stolen fruit. Owly's younger sister, Sophie, used to fly off with nectarines in her talons and usually managed to eat at least half before abandoning the shredded fruit. Strawberries are another favourite. Going back to Owly in this video, I once found a pellet, probably dropped by his mother, that appeared to consist entirely of fragments of oak leaves.

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• tawny
• owl
• eating
• oak
• leaves
• Owly

[RichardMartin2]

Might it be that the leaves contain tannins that are in some way helpful to the digestion or general health?

[Mazryonh]

I've seen dogs eating grass, but Owls eating Leaves? That makes no sense. I thought they kept their stomachs clean by casting pellets from whatever indigestible bits they ate from prey animals.

[PaulBartonPiano]

I like overcast lighting - I can see the owl's head and eyes clearly, light shining through those beautiful oak leaves makes a lovely luminous setting, perfect for a painting! Did you take photos?

We have a 'family' of hedgehogs in our garden. They've shocked us with more macabre dietary behavior than Owly. We have a young hedgehog to rehab but need to keep it away from its mother from now on.

Your owl is certainly more cuddly, innocently chomping away on oak leaves.

[romillyh]

Oh, you might be! Many tawnies like being fussed. I'm tempted to put up more, but our cameras are ancient and the quality is not the best. iMovie always contrives to make them worse.

Good to hear the news from Brazil. Re warsaw, Tom has promised for early Dec. He's been très busy all autumn --have hardly heard from him at all. Stanford must have said no Aimi!