A blog to share barn owl and other wildlife and general news about the Retreat and its environment.
Four of the barn owlets can now fly up to the box exit
03. July 2026, Wildlife
Four of the owlets are now strong enough to fly up about 700mm from the base of the box to the exit hole. The other two will need to develop a bit more then they will be able to do it as well.
Barn owlet news and update
02. July 2026, Wildlife
The barn owlets are doing well. The first two, which got out of the nest box a bit early, 10-12 days ago, are flying well and exploring the neighbourhood. They are probably beginning to hunt for themselves, though I've not witnessed that. They return to the box to take prey from the parents.
Later last evening a third one (58 days old) got out of the box for the first time.
They are all being fed regularly and are growing well.
Continue, to read about their reaction to their first contact with rain…
Feeding the smallest barn owlet
06. June 2026, Wildlife
The smallest of the six barn owlets (currently 26 days old) seems tiny compared to its elder siblings. You might think it is underfed, and perhaps it is underfed due to elder siblings stealings its food.
Certainly, bigger owlets stealing food from smaller siblings does happen. But the parents seem aware of this. In this video the parent (probably the female) specifically passes food to the smallest owlet. This was after all the others have been fed over the previous couple of hours, and so the others were not hungry and they allowed the little one to eat its food undisturbed.
Next problem is how to eat a vole that is larger than itself! Well, anacondas and pythons can swallow deer, and owlets work on the same principle of swallowing voles whole. It took it several minutes to size up the task, then about 7 minutes after receiving the vole it finally managed to ingest the whole vole, head first.
The six barn owlets are doing well
25. May 2026, Wildlife
The six barn owlets are all doing well.
The smallest looks tiny next to its elder siblings, but of course they are twice its age.
Only the smallest does not yet have a full covering of white fluff. The youngest is still largely under the female, for warmth, but she has given up trying to contain the others as they are too large and anyway no longer need her body heat.
As she no longer needs to brood them for warmth, she will be going out to hunt more often, supporting the males hunting efforts as the young get bigger and hungrier. Later she will stop roosting in the box and both parents will simply call in to drop off supplies several times between between dusk and dawn.
This evening I happend to step outside just at the time to see the female barn owl flying towards me. About 15 yards from me she dived into long grass in the field. She didn't reappear immediately, which suggested that she had caught some prey and did not need to continue the hunt. She rose a minute or two later and flew back to the nestbox.
I didn't have a camera with me to catch the dive, but a camera at the box recorded a nice sequence of her landing.
Click the button to see the rest of the photos…
More text/images... Female barn owl landing back at the box with her prey
Still six owlets
18. May 2026, Wildlife
We thought we had lost one of the owlets, but today we got a clear view of them and clearly all six are still there :)
Barn owlet update
16. May 2026, Wildlife
Unfortunately we have lost the youngest owlet, the one that hatched last Sunday. This morning the female owl pulled out the small corpse from underneath her. So now there are five.
Fortunately in this area there is a plentiful prey for them, and the male is hunting well and bringing prey to the female and the young. They should not suffer shortage of food which may otherwise be a common problem.
Of course this is how nature works. Our survival record has been good in the past, with four eggs in 2023 and 2025 (no nesting in 2024), and four hatchings led to four successful fledgings in each case. (The typical survival rate from hatching to fledging is more like 40-50%)
PS see the update - the sixth owlet has been found!!
All six barn owl eggs have hatched
10. May 2026, Wildlife
Less than half a day following the fifth hatching, the sixth and final barn owl egg has also hatched.
The video shows how the female owl stepped to one side for a stretch this morning, giving us a view of a mass of wriggling pink owlets. I think there are six there but they are difficult to count.
The oldest owlet (11 days old) is to the right, is beginning to develop white fluff, and is also seen exercising its winglets. On the left the next oldest is also stretching its winglets.
Hatching of the fifth barn owlet
09. May 2026, Wildlife
The fifth barn owlet has hatched.
We've not been able to see the owlet yet, but the female barn owl has been clearing shell debris from underneath her.
We'll try to add a photo of the fifth owlet tomorrow, once we have had a view of it.
Video of the four barn owlets
07. May 2026, Wildlife
The female barn owl stepped aside for a stretch a few times today, allowing us a better view of the four barn owlets.
On the video (on youTube) you can see the wriggling of the pink blobby owlets.
Besides the two eggs yet to hatch you can also see some egg-shell fragments which are from yesterday's hatching.
