Barred Owl on the Winter Solstice
Early evening on the Winter Solstice, December 22 of last year, was dark gray, misty and wet. A warm rain had fallen for most of the day but had stopped for at least a short break. The bare branches of oaks, tulip poplars and pecans stood black and bleak against low, foggy clouds. Crickets were singing, grass looked green even in the fading light, and lots of small birds foraged in grassy yards and flew from tree to tree, most of them little more than dark, indistinct silhouettes, though I’m sure there were Chipping Sparrows, Eastern Bluebirds, House Finches and maybe Eastern Phoebe and Pine and Yellow-rumped Warblers. I heard the soft ringing jingles of Dark-eyed Juncos, and the clear bright mew of a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, the chatter of Tufted Titmice and Carolina Chickadees, chips of Yellow-rumped Warblers, tseets of White-throated Sparrows and peeps of Northern Cardinals, the songs and trills of Carolina Wrens and rattle of a Red-bellied Woodpecker.
I was on my way home from a late afternoon walk, passing through a lane of trees and bushes where sparrows, cardinals, towhees and thrashers were still scratching around in the leaves under shrubs, when I heard an agitated chattering of small birds behind me. I turned around and saw a very large dark shape on a bare branch of a pecan tree at the edge of the road. At first I thought it was a hawk – but when I lifted binoculars was amazed to see a Barred Owl.
There was no mistaking it. The head was big and round, with round patterns around the eyes – no neck, a large, stocky body, with streaks on the breast and indistinct bars in the wings. The feathered head and round owl face looked spectral and hypnotic, other-worldly, especially in the gray, misty light.
The Owl looked my way and seemed to lower its head and push it forward – in the way owls do – then it turned away. I watched. And watched. It did this several times, looking toward me and then away, and I could not take my eyes away from watching. Meanwhile, a car drove past. The Owl did not fly. Several small birds fussed in a flurry all around, but none of them came close to the Owl. They kept their distance.
After several minutes, an SUV drove past, and I took that chance to try to walk a step or two closer – and the Owl spread its big broad wings and flew. I had an impression of grayish-brown and white streaks and barring, and maybe of a banded tail, and of the big round, muscular-looking head – it flapped its wings, then glided quickly out of sight, into the misty gray trees between our neighborhood and another.
It was a beautiful gift on a Winter Solstice evening, and one that I thought of often during the rest of the busy season, an antidote to the bright lights and noise of stores and shopping malls and highways where I’d been spending most of my time. Not long after I got back home and inside, the rain began again and continued, often steady and hard, for several hours, bringing in slightly cooler weather, though still unseasonably warm. Around midnight, I could still hear crickets singing through the rain.