Barred Owl
Strix varia
Three hoots
whoo-ah (Chapman)
I came across this fellow around 9 AM in the Mohonk preserve. We stared at
each other for about ten minutes. Every so often he would hoot. Each hoot
was accompanied by a white flash from his collar as his throat pouch
swelled (and presumably showed the lighter, lower parts of the
feathers).
New Paltz, June 1997.
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Common Screech Owl Otus asio "A mournful whinny ... Sometimes a series on a single pitch." (Peterson) "... a mellow, tremulous quaver, hauntingly lovely." (Puleston) Long Island, August 1996. "Oh-o-o-o-o that I never had been bor-r-r-r-n! sighs one on this side of the pond, and circles with the restlessness of despair to some new perch on the gray oaks. Then- that I never had been bor-r-r-r-n! echoes another on the farther side with tremulous sincerity, and- bor-r-r-r-n! comes faintly from far in the Lincoln woods." (Thoreau, Walden) |
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Great Horned Owl Bubo virginianus "A resonant hooting of 3 to 8 hoots; male usually 4 or 5, in this rythm: Hoo, hoo-hoo, hoo, hoo; female lower in pitch, 6 to 8, Hoo, hoo-hoo-hoo, hoo-oo, hoo-oo." (Peterson) "Female voice higher-pitched than male." (Sibley) Long Island, January 2001. Pair of Great Horned Owls Pair of Great Horned Owls [Note sonogram of this clip below. The rythms are different, but the two pitch ranges overlap.]  Female Great Horned Owl interrupts male. Frequency range 0-1470Hz Long Island, March 2007. "For sounds in winter nights, and often in winter days, I heard the forlorn but melodious note of a hooting owl indefinitely far; such a sound as the frozen earth would yield if struck with a suitable plectrum, the very lingua vernacula of Walden Wood, and quite familiar to me at last, though I never saw the bird while it was making it. I seldom opened my door in a winter evening without hearing it; Hoo hoo hoo, hoorer, hoo, sounded sonorously, and the first three syllables accented somewhat like how der do; or sometimes hoo, hoo only." (Thoreau, Walden). |
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