Good News Notes:
“The Santa Clarita Valley’s owl population has some new real estate options, as a number of owl nesting boxes have been set up in the city’s parks, open spaces and most recently in the community garden at Central Park.
“There’s approximately six owl boxes throughout the city that we have installed,” said Susan Nelson, city of Santa Clarita parks manager. “We have a couple out in our open space areas, and then we have three owl boxes at a few different park sites: One at Central Park, one at Circle J. Park and one at Canyon Country Park.”
The SCV is home to a number of owl species, including great-horned owls, barn owls, southern spotted owls, screech owls, long-eared owls, burrowing owls in the Castaic Lake area and even an occasional saw-whet owl, according to Ranger Frank Hoffman, head ranger and recreation services supervisor at the Placerita Canyon Natural Area.
Great-horned owls are the SCV’s largest nocturnal aerial predator and have been known to take everything from scorpions and insects to mice, rats, lizards, snakes and even mammals as large as an opossum or skunk, Hoffman added.
“They’re all meat eaters. They don’t eat fruits and vegetables of any kind — they strictly eat meat — and they are, for the most part, very near, if not at the top, of the food chain where they live,” Hoffman said.
They do so with their zygodactyl feet, meaning two toes forward and two back, which, along with the sharp talons at the end of each toe, provide a strong, powerful grip on their prey.
While those owls nest in trees, such as the ones where the owl nesting boxes are located, they, however, won’t be using them, as they often take over abandoned nests.
It’s the smaller barn and screech owls these boxes are trying to attract, as those are the ones that typically nest in a tree’s cavities.
As these owls’ natural habitat is taken by developments or fires, for example, the boxes provide the perfect home for the owls and their owlets, if placed in the right location.
Height, location and direction all matter when it comes to placing owl boxes, meaning it comes as no surprise that the community gardens’ first try was unsuccessful.
“We put them up a couple of years ago, but we never got an owl in them,” said Mike Faragher, chairperson for the maintenance committee at the gardens. “We took them down, and I built brand new ones.”
While the gardens have since seen owls in the area, they have yet to confirm if any have taken up residence in their new boxes.”
View the whole story here: https://signalscv.com/2021/03/city-installs-owl-nest-boxes-in-parks-open-space/