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Alice the Great Horned Owl is a human
imprint...she thinks she's a human since she was injured so young and was raised
by humans. As far as she's concerned Karla Kinstler, her handler, is her
mate. (She's not interested in boys with feathers.) Since Alice
lives, works, and freely interacts with Karla, she directs all of her
vocalizations and breeding behavior toward Karla.
Since Karla plays the role of a male Great
Horned Owl as Alice's mate, she wanted to figure out what all of Alice's
hoots, chitters and squawks mean. She discovered that no one has
ever studied the vocal repertoire of the Great Horned Owl before, even though
they are a common species across all of North America, and even occur in Central
and South America.
With some urging from the Director of the
Global Owl Project, Karla began recording and studying the vocalizations of the
Great Horned Owl. Alice was her main study subject, but the wild owls in
Karla's rural yard were also recorded as they often woke her up in the middle of
the night.
To document the complete vocal repertoire,
recordings around the nest site are very important. But the adults at most
nests Karla watched were so skittish that observations weren't possible, and
the nests were only found well into incubation or after the young had hatched.
She needs observations around the nest beginning even before the eggs are laid.
To this end the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service and Minnesota Department of Natural Resources have granted Karla permits
to breed a permanently injured pair of Great Horned Owls. They will be
housed in a breeding cage outfitted with remote cameras and microphones in a
private location. A release training cage will be attached by an eight
foot long corridor so the youngsters can naturally disperse from their parents
and strengthen their flight muscles before being released. Karla hopes to
have video feeds from the cages streaming live on the internet so people from
around the world can help make observations of the owls, their behaviors, and
their vocalizations.
The breeding owls (pictured below) are ready
and waiting for Karla at the
Raptor Education Group in Antigo, Wisconsin until the cages are built.
You can help! Cash and material
donations are needed to make this project a reality! You can make a
tax-deductible cash donation to this project through the Friends of the Houston
Nature Center using the PayPal Donate button below. A PayPal account is
not required--you can make a donation using a credit card also. Or if you
live nearby and have construction expertise,
we'd like to hear
from you!
Karla traveled to The Netherlands to present
her preliminary research at the
World Owl Conference in 2007. Her research will be published in the
conference proceedings.
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