A baby owl brought into a teacher’s home in Kenya has received an international owl education group’s award for demonstrating to local people that owls are not really bad omens that deserve to be killed.
Bundi, a Verreaux’s eagle owl, was about three days old when the orphaned nestling and a sibling were brought to Francis Atanasio Kithure, an ornithologist and teacher in Kianjai-Meru, central Kenya, in east Africa. A hunter had killed one of the nestlings’ parents and was preparing to kill the chicks when some of Kithure’s students intervened and rescued the babies.
Kithure’s neighbors warned him that welcoming an evil omen like an owl into his central Kenya home would endanger his family and maybe even bring death, but he used the experience of rehabilitating the owl to introduce local people to a more scientific way of looking at the birds.
The smaller of the two orphaned chicks was transferred to a Kenyan Wildlife Service agency, but Bundi, the larger nestling, stayed with Kithure.
“I chose the word ‘Bundi,’ which is a Swahili name for owl,” Kithure says. “In my local language, Kimeru, it means a constructive person who changes lives and minds of people.”
The award will be presented at the 11th annual International Festival of Owls, slated for March 1-3 in Houston, Minn. Kithure will receive the award for Bundi, who was released into the wild in Kenya after further rehabilitation at a Nairobi animal orphanage.
Bundi stayed with Kithure in March and April 2010. The bird is the winner of the Hall of Fame’s 2013 “Lady Gray’l Award,” given to an owl that has done great things to make the world a better place for owls.
Kithure says fear and distrust of owls are common in central Kenya. He remembers seeing an old man throw owl eggs into a local river, hoping that the water would wash the eggs – and bad luck – downstream and away from his family.
Kithure, a teacher trained in ornithology, works with schools and clubs to raise awareness of wildlife ecology. He recalls primary school students bringing him the two orphaned Verreaux’s eagle owl nestlings.
“Being a naturalist and defender of animal rights, I had to question and disapprove of the widely held beliefs that owls are associated with death and that they are tormentors,” he says. “I had to prove to society that contrary to their beliefs, owls can co-exist with man in the same environment.”
It helped that Bundi was a particularly easy-going owl.
“Many people changed their widely held perceptions on owls when people within the society saw that nothing bad happened to me,” Kithure says. “Some concluded that owls are very friendly birds because at maturity Bundi could fly and come back to my house and was very friendly.”
Verreaux’s eagle owls are endangered in central Kenya, in part because their eggs are used in witchcraft, their habitats have been lost, and some owls are killed by eating small birds that have been poisoned by farmers protecting their crops.
Bundi, a Verreaux’s eagle owl, was about three days old when the orphaned nestling and a sibling were brought to Francis Atanasio Kithure, an ornithologist and teacher in Kianjai-Meru, central Kenya, in east Africa. A hunter had killed one of the nestlings’ parents and was preparing to kill the chicks when some of Kithure’s students intervened and rescued the babies.
Kithure’s neighbors warned him that welcoming an evil omen like an owl into his central Kenya home would endanger his family and maybe even bring death, but he used the experience of rehabilitating the owl to introduce local people to a more scientific way of looking at the birds.
The smaller of the two orphaned chicks was transferred to a Kenyan Wildlife Service agency, but Bundi, the larger nestling, stayed with Kithure.
“I chose the word ‘Bundi,’ which is a Swahili name for owl,” Kithure says. “In my local language, Kimeru, it means a constructive person who changes lives and minds of people.”
The award will be presented at the 11th annual International Festival of Owls, slated for March 1-3 in Houston, Minn. Kithure will receive the award for Bundi, who was released into the wild in Kenya after further rehabilitation at a Nairobi animal orphanage.
Bundi stayed with Kithure in March and April 2010. The bird is the winner of the Hall of Fame’s 2013 “Lady Gray’l Award,” given to an owl that has done great things to make the world a better place for owls.
Kithure says fear and distrust of owls are common in central Kenya. He remembers seeing an old man throw owl eggs into a local river, hoping that the water would wash the eggs – and bad luck – downstream and away from his family.
Kithure, a teacher trained in ornithology, works with schools and clubs to raise awareness of wildlife ecology. He recalls primary school students bringing him the two orphaned Verreaux’s eagle owl nestlings.
“Being a naturalist and defender of animal rights, I had to question and disapprove of the widely held beliefs that owls are associated with death and that they are tormentors,” he says. “I had to prove to society that contrary to their beliefs, owls can co-exist with man in the same environment.”
It helped that Bundi was a particularly easy-going owl.
“Many people changed their widely held perceptions on owls when people within the society saw that nothing bad happened to me,” Kithure says. “Some concluded that owls are very friendly birds because at maturity Bundi could fly and come back to my house and was very friendly.”
Verreaux’s eagle owls are endangered in central Kenya, in part because their eggs are used in witchcraft, their habitats have been lost, and some owls are killed by eating small birds that have been poisoned by farmers protecting their crops.
When Wolfgang Scherzinger was a boy living in the Austrian countryside in the 1960s, he took over the care of a Little Owl whose owner could not keep the bird any longer. "She had bought it at an Italian bird-market," Dr. Scherzinger recalls. "The lady implored me never to feed the owl meat or even a prey animal as the owlet was used to being fed small cubes of cheese – from a golden spoon." The young ornithologist ignored that piece of inappropriate dietary advice and soon had the bird, whose Latin name is Athene noctua, eating its rightful food – a mouse.
"I was absolutely impressed with how quickly and powerfully the tiny owl grabbed its prey and ate it with 'owl-typic' gusto," Dr. Scherzinger says. "I was caught by the big eyes, staring in my direction but focused on infinity, as though looking through my body."
Dr. Scherzinger, 69, is the 2013 winner of the World Owl Hall of Fame's Champion of Owls Award, the top prize to be given at the 11th annual International Festival of Owls, slated for March 1-3 in Houston, Minn. He will receive the award and deliver the keynote address at the festival's awards banquet March 2.The Champion of Owls Award recognizes people who have had a broad impact on owls in conservation, science, legislation, education, rehabilitation and other fields. The World Owl Hall of Fame is sponsored by the International Festival of Owls, the Global Owl Project, Bob Kierlin and Mary Burrichter, the James and Judy Sloan Foundation, Tanja Sova and Susan and John Eddy.
Dr. Scherzinger served as zoologist in Germany's Bavarian Forest National Park from 1971 to 2007. He completed field research – most of it with birds – and participated in captive breeding programs to reintroduce Eagle Owls (Bubo bubo) Ural Owls (Strix uralensis), river otters and wildcats into the wild. He also co-authored "Die Eulen Europas," one of the best books ever written on the owls of Europe.
His thorough knowledge of owl behavior, vocalizations, and development comes in part from rearing 18 species in captivity and successfully breeding 16 of them. The rest comes from observing at least eight species in the wild in both Europe and China.
Now retired to a village in the Bavarian Alps, Scherzinger advises organizations that manage national parks and wilderness areas, especially in Austria. He's also collecting field data on the rare Sichuan Wood Owl, restricted to a very small area of old growth forest in the high mountains of China.
"People of any social and educational status should open their minds and get at least a glimpse of nature's treasures," Scherzinger says. "Owls represent the rather hidden part of this richness, and whoever gets in contact with these enchanting birds will learn they are unique and exciting – not devils or ominous ghosts. And owls need friends and our support."
"I was absolutely impressed with how quickly and powerfully the tiny owl grabbed its prey and ate it with 'owl-typic' gusto," Dr. Scherzinger says. "I was caught by the big eyes, staring in my direction but focused on infinity, as though looking through my body."
Dr. Scherzinger, 69, is the 2013 winner of the World Owl Hall of Fame's Champion of Owls Award, the top prize to be given at the 11th annual International Festival of Owls, slated for March 1-3 in Houston, Minn. He will receive the award and deliver the keynote address at the festival's awards banquet March 2.The Champion of Owls Award recognizes people who have had a broad impact on owls in conservation, science, legislation, education, rehabilitation and other fields. The World Owl Hall of Fame is sponsored by the International Festival of Owls, the Global Owl Project, Bob Kierlin and Mary Burrichter, the James and Judy Sloan Foundation, Tanja Sova and Susan and John Eddy.
Dr. Scherzinger served as zoologist in Germany's Bavarian Forest National Park from 1971 to 2007. He completed field research – most of it with birds – and participated in captive breeding programs to reintroduce Eagle Owls (Bubo bubo) Ural Owls (Strix uralensis), river otters and wildcats into the wild. He also co-authored "Die Eulen Europas," one of the best books ever written on the owls of Europe.
His thorough knowledge of owl behavior, vocalizations, and development comes in part from rearing 18 species in captivity and successfully breeding 16 of them. The rest comes from observing at least eight species in the wild in both Europe and China.
Now retired to a village in the Bavarian Alps, Scherzinger advises organizations that manage national parks and wilderness areas, especially in Austria. He's also collecting field data on the rare Sichuan Wood Owl, restricted to a very small area of old growth forest in the high mountains of China.
"People of any social and educational status should open their minds and get at least a glimpse of nature's treasures," Scherzinger says. "Owls represent the rather hidden part of this richness, and whoever gets in contact with these enchanting birds will learn they are unique and exciting – not devils or ominous ghosts. And owls need friends and our support."
Owls should be appreciated for their mystery and power as well as their role in protecting human health, says Dr. Ana Trejo, winner of a 2013 Special Achievement Award from the World Owl Hall of Fame in Houston, Minn.
“I think people should be aware of the important role that owls have, mainly as natural controls of mice potentially dangerous to human health,” Dr. Trejo says.
Dr. Trejo’s research and conservation work have contributed to the protection of the species by highlighting owls’ role in the control of rodents, including those responsible for transmission of hantavirus in Patagonia, a forested ecosystem in Argentina and Chile.
Hantavirus, a relatively new virus carried on rodent waste, causes flu-like symptoms in humans and can lead to death.
Dr. Trejo, professor of vertebrate zoology at the University of Comahue in Bariloche, in the Argentine Patagonia, said most people know little about owls because the birds are inconspicuous and nocturnal.
“I have developed many projects to try to bring that awareness to children and people in general,” she said. “My opinion is that much more work has to be done to increase popular knowledge on owls.”
“She has developed research and teaching activities since the late 1980s, focused on raptor research, especially on Patagonia’s owls, such as Concon (Strix rufipes), Magellanic owls (Bubo magellanicus) and Austral-Pygmy owls (Glaucidium nanum),” says Dr. Miguel D. Saggese, who nominated Dr. Trejo for the award. Dr. Saggese teaches veterinary microbiology and avian, exotic and wildlife medicine at Western University of Health Sciences in Pomona, Calif.
“Another passion of Dr. Trejo is promoting respect, love and care for wildlife in citizens,” Saggese says. “Besides giving talks to diverse audiences, Dr. Trejo has published articles for education and general interest magazines, and she is leading outreach projects to the community. As part of these activities, lately she co-authored a chapter in a nature program on a TV channel for children, focused on owls.”
Dr. Trejo, who completed her dissertation on prey selection of Magellanic owls, has a broad understanding of animal behavior, physiology, ecology and evolutionary relationships. In addition to her scientific publications, she contributed a chapter to the 2004 book “The Raptors of Chile” and a chapter to an upcoming book on neotropical owls.
The professor currently lives in San Carlos de Bariloche in Nahuel Huapi National Park, northwestern Argentine Patagonia. Most recently she is studying songbirds’ and other perching birds’ “mobbing” reactions to Pygmy owl calls. Mobbing occurs when smaller, weaker birds cooperate to drive a predator away from their nests.
Dr. Trejo traces her emergence as a biologist to age 7, when she came nose to beak with a barn owl in her family’s backyard one night.
“My mom called me in for dinner,” she explains. “I began to pick up my doll and then I saw it, a medium-sized owl perched on a tree. My first thought was of fear, but I was very impressed, hypnotized. I remember its big, dark, staring eyes and its pale face and chest, like a ghost! The bird then flew away and its silent flight left me amazed. I think that first impression marked me as a biologist.”
“I think people should be aware of the important role that owls have, mainly as natural controls of mice potentially dangerous to human health,” Dr. Trejo says.
Dr. Trejo’s research and conservation work have contributed to the protection of the species by highlighting owls’ role in the control of rodents, including those responsible for transmission of hantavirus in Patagonia, a forested ecosystem in Argentina and Chile.
Hantavirus, a relatively new virus carried on rodent waste, causes flu-like symptoms in humans and can lead to death.
Dr. Trejo, professor of vertebrate zoology at the University of Comahue in Bariloche, in the Argentine Patagonia, said most people know little about owls because the birds are inconspicuous and nocturnal.
“I have developed many projects to try to bring that awareness to children and people in general,” she said. “My opinion is that much more work has to be done to increase popular knowledge on owls.”
“She has developed research and teaching activities since the late 1980s, focused on raptor research, especially on Patagonia’s owls, such as Concon (Strix rufipes), Magellanic owls (Bubo magellanicus) and Austral-Pygmy owls (Glaucidium nanum),” says Dr. Miguel D. Saggese, who nominated Dr. Trejo for the award. Dr. Saggese teaches veterinary microbiology and avian, exotic and wildlife medicine at Western University of Health Sciences in Pomona, Calif.
“Another passion of Dr. Trejo is promoting respect, love and care for wildlife in citizens,” Saggese says. “Besides giving talks to diverse audiences, Dr. Trejo has published articles for education and general interest magazines, and she is leading outreach projects to the community. As part of these activities, lately she co-authored a chapter in a nature program on a TV channel for children, focused on owls.”
Dr. Trejo, who completed her dissertation on prey selection of Magellanic owls, has a broad understanding of animal behavior, physiology, ecology and evolutionary relationships. In addition to her scientific publications, she contributed a chapter to the 2004 book “The Raptors of Chile” and a chapter to an upcoming book on neotropical owls.
The professor currently lives in San Carlos de Bariloche in Nahuel Huapi National Park, northwestern Argentine Patagonia. Most recently she is studying songbirds’ and other perching birds’ “mobbing” reactions to Pygmy owl calls. Mobbing occurs when smaller, weaker birds cooperate to drive a predator away from their nests.
Dr. Trejo traces her emergence as a biologist to age 7, when she came nose to beak with a barn owl in her family’s backyard one night.
“My mom called me in for dinner,” she explains. “I began to pick up my doll and then I saw it, a medium-sized owl perched on a tree. My first thought was of fear, but I was very impressed, hypnotized. I remember its big, dark, staring eyes and its pale face and chest, like a ghost! The bird then flew away and its silent flight left me amazed. I think that first impression marked me as a biologist.”
A one-year study of a Taiwan owl species once thought to be nearly extinct led to a 25-year career for Dr. Lucia Liu Severinghaus, 2013 winner of a World Owl Hall of Fame Special Achievement Award.
In 1985, the government of Taiwan asked Dr. Severinghaus to do a one-year study of the Lanyu Scops Owl and make suggestions for its conservation. Lanyu, also known as Orchid Island, is off the coast of Taiwan in the Pacific Ocean.
“Little did I anticipate that that one-year study would lead to a 25-year love affair with owls,” Dr. Severinghaus says. “Each marked bird became recognizable as an individual, and it was fun to look for them in the forest and to recognize them as old friends.”
She discovered many unusual things about the Lanyu Scops Owl: that it breeds in cavities like many owls but often changes cavities and changes mates from year to year.
“There were always aspects about their biology that drove me to do another year of work, in order to find answers,” she says. “Even after 25 years, there are still many aspects of their biology I do not understand, and I hope someday someone else will decide to devote his or her life to further our understanding and care of this species.”
Dr. Severinghaus was a research fellow at Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan, from 1983 to 2010.
Originally, Dr. Severinghaus worked in the face of local people’s conviction that the owl was the messenger of the devil. Today, the owl draws tourists to Lanyu.
“I hope the people on Lanyu, who no longer consider owls the messenger of the devil and now value their owls as a unique ecotourism resource, will protect the habitat needed by owls and manage tourism development sustainably,” she says.
In a quarter-century of research, Dr. Severinghaus banded 1,377 of the owls and tracked their survival and activities. She estimated the current population is about 5,000 and not endangered. She also surveyed subspecies of the owl in Japan and the Philippines.
Dr. Severinghaus helped found the Asian Raptor Research and Conservation Network, gave many public lectures and TV interviews, and wrote articles for newspapers and magazines to promote conservation and teach people about the Lanyu Scops Owl.
She also produced a film titled “Du-Du Wu: The Story of the Lanyu Scops Owl,” which was picked up by the National Geographic Channel and shown throughout Asia and Taiwan.
Her husband, Sheldon Severinghaus, an ornithologist who studied endangered birds in Asia for many years, nominated her for the special achievement award.
“Lucia broke the cultural mold for Chinese women when she chose to study birds in the wild, especially a nocturnal owl. Not even men did that when she started out. Now many women are in field research,” he says. “And in a culture where owls were feared and avoided, she got the Lanyu Scops Owl listed as a national treasure under Taiwan’s Cultural Properties Preservation Act.”
In 1985, the government of Taiwan asked Dr. Severinghaus to do a one-year study of the Lanyu Scops Owl and make suggestions for its conservation. Lanyu, also known as Orchid Island, is off the coast of Taiwan in the Pacific Ocean.
“Little did I anticipate that that one-year study would lead to a 25-year love affair with owls,” Dr. Severinghaus says. “Each marked bird became recognizable as an individual, and it was fun to look for them in the forest and to recognize them as old friends.”
She discovered many unusual things about the Lanyu Scops Owl: that it breeds in cavities like many owls but often changes cavities and changes mates from year to year.
“There were always aspects about their biology that drove me to do another year of work, in order to find answers,” she says. “Even after 25 years, there are still many aspects of their biology I do not understand, and I hope someday someone else will decide to devote his or her life to further our understanding and care of this species.”
Dr. Severinghaus was a research fellow at Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan, from 1983 to 2010.
Originally, Dr. Severinghaus worked in the face of local people’s conviction that the owl was the messenger of the devil. Today, the owl draws tourists to Lanyu.
“I hope the people on Lanyu, who no longer consider owls the messenger of the devil and now value their owls as a unique ecotourism resource, will protect the habitat needed by owls and manage tourism development sustainably,” she says.
In a quarter-century of research, Dr. Severinghaus banded 1,377 of the owls and tracked their survival and activities. She estimated the current population is about 5,000 and not endangered. She also surveyed subspecies of the owl in Japan and the Philippines.
Dr. Severinghaus helped found the Asian Raptor Research and Conservation Network, gave many public lectures and TV interviews, and wrote articles for newspapers and magazines to promote conservation and teach people about the Lanyu Scops Owl.
She also produced a film titled “Du-Du Wu: The Story of the Lanyu Scops Owl,” which was picked up by the National Geographic Channel and shown throughout Asia and Taiwan.
Her husband, Sheldon Severinghaus, an ornithologist who studied endangered birds in Asia for many years, nominated her for the special achievement award.
“Lucia broke the cultural mold for Chinese women when she chose to study birds in the wild, especially a nocturnal owl. Not even men did that when she started out. Now many women are in field research,” he says. “And in a culture where owls were feared and avoided, she got the Lanyu Scops Owl listed as a national treasure under Taiwan’s Cultural Properties Preservation Act.”
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Many thanks are due to our prize donors and the army of volunteers that make this event possible.
Please contact us for information on having your business or organization become a sponsor, and please patronize our sponsors.
Many thanks are due to our prize donors and the army of volunteers that make this event possible.