March 17
Now that the light has come up, gold and white-pale gold—I can see the male owl again like I did yesterday morning, only because I know where to look. Warmth spreads in my solar plexus just below my rib cage, and awe, and love. In some ways they depend on me to leave them alone and protect them as well as I can. My yard is a shelter with fences and mostly quiet moments, a dog to keep out intruders, and me, a loving force I think they feel. They look at me for encouragement and they're curious about me, but we keep our boundaries intact.
But the workmen next door have disturbed their boundaries, and mine, today. They arrived mid-morning and began knocking down the tall fence between our yards with sledgehammers. I know the fence needs to be replaced; it was built 33 years ago and has been leaning and full of holes for the past few years. I wonder if I might reclaim a few boards for the fairy garden! It has green moss on it that I like, but it will look fresher with new boards.
The owl in the pine tree tolerated the noise and change of scenery for an hour or two, but then, when I came up to work in my office, I opened the Nestcam in my computer browser and heard him hooting. It seemed that as soon as I stepped outside, he stopped. But I came back in and listened to the recording: two were hooting, possibly even three at the same time, and they were sounding distressed. I could still only see one owl.
When I walked out on the deck and they stopped hooting, I wondered if seeing me helped them calm down. That sounds unlikely, but the owl I could see in the pine tree stayed right there for another hour or so. I didn’t see the second owl that was hooting, but I think it was the female in the hollow. I’ve seen female barred owls hooting in the nest boxes on the Owlcam site at Cornell.
March 19, 2025
It's windy and cool, cloudy and gray and fresh this morning. I didn't see the owls yesterday, but I heard one hooting last night and a couple of nights ago. I dreamed that I saw one fly up, look into the hollow, and look back out again, as I’d seen him do in real life.
The new fence is a mixture of an unnatural sea-green and blond treated wood. It’s even and mostly level, with no gaps like the old one had, and they built it in one day. It's ugly and pragmatic now, but it will weather. Yesterday, the supervisor saw me outside and asked if I wanted him to cut down or trim my sweet gum, next to the deck, that's leaning into the neighbors' yard. I told him they’d said they were going to trim the huge oak limb leaning over my yard. He said he’d check on it. I told him I'd check with my tree guys about the sweet gum. It’s healthy and I don't think it's a hazard. The owls need all the trees they can find.
I saw crows, but no owls, over in the woods yesterday evening. After that, several hawks or eagles began making big sweeps in the sky—not the tight circles that buzzards fly in. Their undersides were golden, white, and reddish, and watching them catch the updrafts lifted me up, too.
This morning I was surprised to see that the workmen had sawed off one of the trunks of my sweet gum tree, without my permission. I stepped out on my deck, waved, and yelled at the tree cutter to stop. Then I conferred with the supervisor who happened to be standing nearby and said he’d check on it. My neighbor arrived later, standing behind my fence again, and while I tried to ask about his giant oak limbs, he said pointedly, several times, that he has the legal right to cut limbs that hang over his property because they could damage the new fence. Finally, I said, “Okay, well that’s fine. So I can cut the limbs from your trees that hang over my yard.” He said yes, and I finally realized that he’d had no plans to cut those.
I thought I saw him soften a couple of times, when I asked about the owls and when I agreed that it was fine to finish cutting the large limb. I don’t understand why he wanted to cut my tree but not his own. Human nature, I guess.
March 21
My four local grandchildren slept over last night. After protein pancakes and some TV, we went outside to look at our fairy house at the base of the owls’ hollow oak tree. It had been ravaged by rain and wind. They started picking up boards, moss, and rocks and made it look better than ever, with a camellia blossom to top it off. We talked about enlarging it with side walls the next time, so that the furniture my oldest granddaughter made can fit inside.
I was standing at the end of the breezeway, watching them and Charlie, when I saw the owl fly away and over the back fence. I looked at the footage and it looked like he’d come from one of the trees near the back fence. He must have been watching us.
Yesterday was the spring equinox, and my yoga teacher Diane says we all need to create space for new light and be kind to ourselves. A good time to work on a fairy garden! Having the grandchildren here, with an owl flying over, brought in the new light for me.
Evening
This evening my neighbors a few doors down, Robin and Richard, were walking their border collie on the berm behind my fence, and I went out to talk to them. Robin told me that last June they’d found an adult barred owl in a tree in their backyard that “wasn’t well.” It had climbed a little tree in their yard but couldn’t fly and wouldn’t eat or drink anything, so they called the wildlife rehabilitation people and they came to get it. She didn’t know the outcome. I wonder if it was one of “my” owls. There’s no way to know, but at least it happened after mating season was over. I hope it was able to get well.
It could have had avian flu or another disease, like salmonellosis. Only a few cases of avian flu were reported last year in West Tennessee, so probably not. Another friend of mine volunteers at Mississippi Wildlife Rehabilitation and recently transported a barred owl that looked like it had been hit by a car, but its injuries didn’t seem to be life-threatening. I’m glad to learn that I have a contact there.
March 22
At least I’m seeing bluebirds, cardinals, finches, woodpeckers, and lots of other little birds every day. While researching the trees in my yard, I discovered that finches love to eat the sweet gum seeds in those round sticky balls that hurt my feet when I step on them. I have enough sweet gums to feed a whole ‘charm’ of finches.
March 23
The workmen are now building two decks and making lots of noise in the neighbors’ backyard. Sometimes they argue, laugh, and play music. Does the constant banging keep the owls away?
I remind myself that through these ephemeral, flighty, unpredictable owls, life keeps teaching me to let go, a lesson I’ve gone over again and again, one that I always need. To let what is, be.
Evening
I went out to sit on the deck at 7:30, hoping to see some owl activity, and I got more than I was wishing for. First, I heard an owl hooting loudly behind me. I looked over the lower section of my roof and saw one up in a tree on the other side of the house. Then I started hearing more owls. I turned on my voice recorder and it sounded as if there might be three back there, hooting at the same time. I was also hearing a response call from somewhere else—too much sound all at once to try to locate and discern. I sat back down in my chair and saw the response caller, newly arrived from the woods, in an oak at the far opposite corner of my backyard, where I’m used to seeing them enter my yard. It, the male, flew across my yard toward me and right over my head and the lower roof to meet the owl behind me. After the mating calls stopped, I peeked around and only saw one, but I was sure the two owls had met. Not much later, the male owl flew directly over me again, paused on a branch in the middle of my yard, long enough for me to get a good look, and glided back to the woods. I went to bed happy.
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