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Barred Owl Watch

SHARON — Peggy Martinez was out on a stroll through the woods near her Sharon home last week when she spotted a large barred owl, sitting owlishly in a tree. The owl seemed confident that its feathers would act as camouflage, so it didn’t stir when Martinez went to get her husband, Oscar. 

He returned with his iPhone X and found the owl more or less where his wife had seen her. 

“She had moved closer to the road, about 10 feet,” Martinez said. After snapping the iPhone photo on this page, he took another photo with an Olympus camera. 

“It never startled,” Martinez said. “It just looked at me and at a passing truck that had stopped.” 

Eileen Fielding, director of the Audubon Center in Sharon, said that the barred owl population this year does seem to be in a dreamlike state. 

“It’s not unusual for barred owls to be visible in daytime and to act pretty calm,” she said.  

“This one looks fairly normal.  That said, it’s possible that the owl might also be in a weakened state. We’ve had many barred owls come in recently, injured or otherwise debilitated. It may be that some of their usual rodent prey was in short supply this past winter.”

— Cynthia Hochswender

Lakeville Journal

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