Family waits for new winged neighbors to emerge

[Donna]

LEAVENWORTH — A colorful and noisy assortment of birds flitted through the early-morning sky over Eagle Creek on Thursday.

Western wood-pewees, Brewer’s blackbirds, Say’s Phoebes and swallows.

What wasn’t taking to the skies, though, were the two juvenile barn owls huddled in the Hafermanns’ dog carrier.

“I want to just sneak up and look at them, but I don’t want to disturb them,� Shannon Hafermann said quietly, as she and her family waited for the owls to emerge.

After nearly an hour, though, the birds refused to budge. So the family walked back to their nearby home in the wooded canyon north of Leavenworth.

The Hafermanns knew little about barn owls when they answered a call for help earlier this spring from Debra Burnett, a licensed wildlife rehabilitator from Manson who was caring for 28 baby barn owls. The owls were all founds in haystacks in the Quincy and Moses Lake area by truck drivers transporting the hay.

Burnett appealed to the public to help pay for the birds’ care, and to find homes for the birds to be released once they fledged. She was looking for rural homes or farms to place owls, since they need a steady diet of mice and other small rodents to survive.

So far, four of the birds have gone to a farm in the Othello area and a few have been released in Manson. Others are slated for release this month in Dryden, Plain and Quincy.

Shannon Hafermann said she cut out a newspaper article on Burnett’s appeal, and talked with her family. At their rural home, they enjoy watching birds. For the last five years, they have set up a video camera near a tree swallow nest in their yard and watched live feeds of the birds and their babies on their television.

“When we heard about the owls we thought it was something we could do,� she said.

So Shannon; her husband, Maury; and children, Halla and Luke, started researching online and contacting bird experts to find out more about the owls. They ordered an owl box kit and built it themselves.

“At first we worried that they would eat small birds,� Shannon said. “But we talked to a biologist and learned that they really like mice.�

On Wednesday, a pair of owls estimated to be about 4 1/2 months old arrived at their new home in a large dog carrier. The birds spent the night in a grassy field outside their home, with the opening of the carrier facing the bird box the Hafermanns had nailed to a large tree.

Thinking the birds would like to get out early, the family was up and out the door by 6:30 a.m. Their neighbor, Wenatchee Valley College professor Derek Sheffield, joined them as they trekked through the field to the carrier.

Shannon Hafermann opened the carrier and the family leaned in for a closer look. The birds, with their unique heart-shaped faces, were huddled in the back.

“I’m glad I’m not small and furry,� Sheffield joked.

Seven-year-old Luke had already named the male bird Storming Rapid. Halla named the female Sweet Pea.

After watching the birds closely for several minutes, they left the birds to watch from a short distance away. As they waited, they noted all the birds flying and singing overhead.

“This is a great area for birds,� Sheffield said. “It’s a transition zone between the woods and the creek.�

He pointed out warblers, flycatchers and blackbirds. Halla, who has been studying birds, pointed out a goldfinch and a barn swallow. A wild turkey gobbled in the distance.

There is no guarantee that the barn owls will stick around. But the Hafermanns hope they like the grassy field, with its abundance of mice and voles, and the newly built owl box.

By late morning, the owls had emerged from the box. Shannon Hafermann found the male perched nearby in a chokecherry tree.

“I think that’s the best-case scenario, that they are out of the kennel but they haven’t just high-tailed it out of the area,� she said.