By Bill Bower |
Deborah went on to write that she too had found a rabbit killed in the same manner. These ladies were curious as to what killed the rabbits.
The great-horned owl’s signature method when dealing with large prey is to behead its victim and take only the head to its nest or eating perch.
In Kansas, a study had been done on 28 kills by great-horned owls, with 60% of these kills having been decapitated. The great-horned owl will also crush the bones of its prey to make it more compact for carrying; however, if the prey is too heavy to fly with even after dismemberment, this owl will, on occasion, return to the kill site to feed on the carcass.
Occasionally, the cached food will spoil and be disregarded, especially in times of plenty. In one extraordinary case, carcasses of 113 rats (Rattus norvegicus) were found near a single owl’s roost. All of the rats were relatively intact except that their skulls had been split open and the brains removed. The great-horned owl’s hunting success seems to require a fairly open under-story. Although they are no match to the quantity of rodents, hares and rabbits are the most significant prey of the great-horned owl.
In America, the great-horned owl is both the most prolific and diverse predator of other birds of prey, with other accomplished raptor-hunters, such as the goshawk and golden eagle, being more restricted in range, habitat and number in North America, resulting in a more minor impact.
From the Canadian border to Mexico, statistics show that the following (mostly young) are known to fall prey to great-horned owls: 21 out of 22 hawks and eagles; 16 out of 18 owls; 6 out of 7 falcons and 1 out of 3 vultures.
Once a great-horned owl reaches maturity it has very few enemies and usually lives fifteen or more years in the wild. It has been recorded that one great-horned owl held in captivity lived to the age of twenty-nine. Those that are killed at night by cars have swooped down to catch prey along the roadways; others are killed or injured when coming
in contact with wires or branches while diving for prey; some are electrocuted when landing on electric poles and coming in contact with live electric wires, while others die when becoming entangled in electric fences.
The genus name for the great-horned owl is “Bubo”, which is Latin, meaning owl; the species name is “Virginianus”, which is also Latin, meaning “of Virginia”, where the first specimen known to science was collected. The great-horned owl, which is widespread over the United States and Canada, is one of the largest and most powerful of all North American owls, standing more than two-feet tall, with a wingspan of five feet.
Although owls are protected today by law, intermittently from 1885 until 1965, a bounty was paid on the great-horned owl. From 1965 until 1972, the great-horned owl was not given any protection and then, the Federal
Migratory Bird Treaty Act was ratified with Mexico, with protection
extended to all native birds.
The great-horned owl is important within nature’s intricate system, playing a big part in nature’s checks and balances. If left unchecked, a mouse population from one mated pair mathematically could expand to 235,00 in one year, and a rat population from one mated pair could mathematically expand to 940,369,969,152 in a five-year period. The great-horned owl’s diet helps to keep these populations in hand. If that’s not enough evidence to prove to you that owls are beneficial, the great-horned owl is the only predator in the wild that kills skunks on a regular basis. During my career as a wildlife officer, almost every
injured great-horned owl that I handled smelled like a skunk.
Since the number one enemy of the crow is the great-horned owl, hunters have learned to use a decoy and call of the great-horned owl to lure crows into gun range