The question, posed to me from my husband via telephone caught me off guard. I was enjoying an evening watching NFL while he worked to repair a customer’s servers. I knew he was on his way home, so the first question in my mind was “What is he bringing home?”. But, before I could ask, he explained.
He was on his way home when he happened upon an owl on the road. He stopped the car, put on his emergency flashers and motioned the cars behind him to go around. The owl was alive but didn’t fly away when he approached him, so he emptied a carrier that we keep in the car (for such emergencies) and put the owl in it.
So, now we had a full grown Waldkauz (tawny owl) in my kitchen. We checked his wings are were relieved to find that they weren’t broken. We noted no other injuries and no open wounds. Wolf retrieved the large cage we keep in the attic and we put him in it and left him in peace for the night.
This morning he is much livelier and seems much more aware of his surroundings. So, barring any unforeseen circumstances, we’ll take a trip to where Wolf found him and release him back into his territory this evening. A local wildlife expert agreed with our plan.
As I laughingly told Wolf this morning, so goes my normal routine: feed the dog, make sure the cats have enough food, measure the blood sugar and give our diabetic cat a shot of insulin and cut up raw chicken to feed the owl.
I do so love living in the country!
