Peak District Retreat Blog: Wildlife and general news about the Retreat and its environment

The barn owl nest box continues to attract attention from other birds, even though it is permanently inhabited by a barn owl sitting on four eggs (first hatching due tomorrow).

Here we had a bit of a face-off between a magpie and a stock dove. Then later two swallows showed interest, with one perching on the entrance hole to peer in.

Our male barn owl has been something of an absentee mate. He rarely spends the night in the nest box, and isn't very good at bringing prey to feed the brooding female.

One evening it appeared as though she 'snapped' and stormed out to fetch him back! She must have known where to find him (there aren't many pubs near us...) as she was only gone for 3-4 minutes and then chased him back.

She appeared to shepherd him back into the box, whereupon he started screeching and stamping as if to say “I don't want to be here! I'm not supposed to be here!”

It didn't cure him - he has continued to be absent most of the time, though usually visits overnight and brings a few voles.

Youtube link: https://youtu.be/6gMdgtIHnl8 

Both barn owls left the box briefly to perch on the ledge, with the female to the left and the male to the right.

Inside the box there are four eggs. This may be the full clutch, or their may be more to come - in a previous year there was a 5-day gap between the laying of the penultimate egg and the last egg.

The female barn owl steps aside for a stretch and reveals that she has laid a fourth egg. Is that it, or might there be more to come?

We now have three eggs in the barn owl nest box.

There may yet be more to come, though the male owl is not doing a good job of bringing food to the female and that may inhibit further egg production.

In 2023 there were four eggs, and in 2020 there were six.

A second egg has been laid by our resident barn owl.

There are likely to be more laid over the next few days - watch this space.

The first barn owl egg has been laid.

A typical clutch is 4-7 eggs. Look out for the next arrival over the next day or two…

The barn owls won the tussle with stock doves and others to occupy the nest box. A pair moved in a week ago and seem settled in for the season.

You can monitor them on our live cams.

The one that looks a little paler over the head and back is the male (to the right on the attached photo), and the slightly darker one (to the left) is the female. It is difficult to distinguish them if you see them alone and don't have the other with which to compare. If you get a good view on the outside camera in daylight you may be able to distinguish a couple of dozen small black spots on the white feathers on the flanks of one of them (though they may be hidden by the folded wings). This is the female, the male not having any such spots (the second photo shows the female).

The expected behaviour is that the female will hardly leave the box at all, or even not at all, for the next two months, so you will almost always see at least one owl when you look at the in-box camera. The male is supposed to do all the hunting, bringing food to her, and to her and the young once they hatch. Once the young are about four weeks old and getting larger and needing more food the female starts hunting as well.

We have live streaming camera feeds from our barn owl nest box.

The owl activity varies by season.

Currently we have one barn owl roosting most daytimes from approximately 5-8 a.m. until 4-8 p.m. During her residence you will see her on the camera feed inside the nest box. You may catch her perching on the ledge outside the box when she arrives in the early morning and/or when she exists the box late afternoon/dusk.

If they use the box for breeding then it will be permanently occupied by the female for about three months during which time the male is in charge of hunting and providing.

The camera feeds are on our live owl cam page.

We're waiting to see whether or not we will have a breeding barn owl pair this year.

A barn owl (female we think) has roosted here most daytimes over the winter (though not as regularly as last winter).

We haven't seen her mate. We're waiting to see whether a mate appears, whether they do nest, and if so whether they nest here.

And alongside that, we wonder whether the box be taken over by tawny owls, or by stock doves. Check back later to see how it turns out…