Lady Spotswood, the Spotted Owl
photo credit: Nick Bossenbroek
The Most Hated Owl in North America
20, 2024
Oh, hi there. So, you spotted me! Get it? You spotted Strix occidentalis, the Spotted Owl! Ha ha! Well, actually God spotted me -- or evolution or whatever.
I don't know why I should be joking around like this, though. I've got plenty to worry about.
Loggers hate me here in the Pacific Northwest. They've been sore ever since the US Fish & Wildlife Service gave me Endangered Species status in 19901. The locals want the right to cut down old-growth forest as they see fit, and since such forest is my natural habitat, I am their bete noire, so to speak, the owl that they love to hate. I don't want to say that they are cold hearted, but let's put it this way: they keep telling people that we Spotted Owls taste like chicken2. The very idea! And so I am caught in an ongoing political tug-of-war between environmentalists and loggers3.
Properly speaking, of course, the anger of those loggers is mainly directed at only one of the three subspecies of Spotted Owl in the States, namely the Northern Spotted Owl (Strix occidentalis caurina). But my two stateside cousins are facing problems of their own. Both the California Spotted Owl (Strix occidentalis occidentalis) and the Mexican Spotted Owl (Strix occidentalis lucida) are threatened by high-severity wildfires4. According to the Audubon Society, "Destructive megafires burned more of their habitat in 2020 and 2021 alone than in the previous 35 years5."
And then there's the invader from the east. Both we California and Northern subspecies of Spotted Owl have to deal with the Barred Owl that has been horning in on our habitat since the mid-1900s6. It used to be a purely eastern species but has been moving west of late, apparently thanks in part to the changes wrought in the North American landscape by European settlers7.
The Barred Owl is a species of our own Strix genus, you understand, and that's a problem. There is a reason why owl species of the same genus are not generally found in the same area. It's because they both end up competing for the same environmental niche. And that's just what happened when Barred Owls joined us Spotted Owls in the self-same territory.
No sooner had we Northern Spotted Owls received federal protection, than the similar-looking Barred Owls started outcompeting us on every front. They are more aggressive than yours truly, they lay more eggs than yours truly, they require less territory than yours truly, and they are less finicky eaters than yours truly. They are even taller than yours truly, if only by an inch or so8.
And what was the result of this strigophile mismatch? What else? Our Spotted Owl numbers started plummeting.
Journalist Franz Lidz summed up this dismal situation as follows in his 2024 New York Times article entitled "They Shoot Owls in California, Don't They?"
The author reports in the same article that the population of Canadian Spotted Owls in British Columbia, just north of my stateside territory, is down to one. That's right, one. And I don't mean one pair, either, I mean one single Spotted Owl, a female, as it turns out.
"If the trend continues," writes Lidz, "the northern Spotted Owl could become the first owl subspecies in the United States to go extinct."
There it is, folks, the dreaded "E" word.
Now maybe you can see why the Fish & Wildlife Service has come up with a plan to kill 15,000 Barred Owls per year over the next 30 years. That's a total of 450,000 Barred Owls10.
That may sound extreme, but the agency says that the culling operation will affect less than one-half of 1% of the current North American Barred Owl population11.
That shows you just how populous and resilient my rival is.
But the plan is not without its critics.
In the words of Wayne Pacelle, president of Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy:
Wow! Then there's THAT, huh? What a to-do!
With all this drama going on, I will have to stay up at night thinking of ways to keep this blog from sounding gloomy. Good job that I am already a night owl by habit13. But how do I accent the positive when I am on the verge of extinction?
Well, I suppose I can always close my blog entries with a joke. Let's see now...
Why can't Strix occidentalis play hide-and-seek?
Because we're always spotted!
Get it? Because we're always SPOTTED? Ha ha!
Editor's Note: Ouch! Um... okay. Thanks, Lady Spotswood.
Permit me to add a link to help your fans keep Strix occidentalis straight when it comes to subspecies.
This map at the Cornell Lab website shows the territories that each of the three Spotted Owl subspecies calls home14. The Northern subspecies predominates in the Pacific Northwest, the California subspecies in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and the Mexican subspecies in the forested mountains and canyonlands of Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, and Colorado.
Also, I should point out that there is a new wrinkle in the debate over culling the Barred Owl to the tune of 15,000 birds per year in the Pacific Northwest. In a November 2024 post, the group Friends of Animals states that there is new evidence showing that Barred Owls have inhabited the Pacific Northwest for thousands of years. They claim that the agency downplayed that possibility in their Environmental Impact Statement. Friends of Animals is suing the Fish & Wildlife Service over the culling plan15, as are Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy16.
1: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lists northern spotted owl as threatened on June 23, 1990., HistoryLink.org
2: The spotted owl made the rich richer, High Country News
3: A delicate balance: the controversial plan to protect the spotted owl, Salish Current
4: California Spotted Owl, National Park Service
5: Fire Is a Major Threat to California Spotted Owls, Audubon
6: Spotted Owl and Barred Owl, Redwood National and State Parks California
7: Barred Owl Management, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
8: Spotted Owl and Barred Owl, Redwood National and State Parks California
9: They Shoot Owls in California, Don't They?, The New York Times
10: Barred Owl Management Strategy Final EIS FAQs, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
11: Environment Plan finalized to kill thousands of barred owls around Northwest, Washington State Standard
12: Environment Plan finalized to kill thousands of barred owls around Northwest, Oregon Capital Chronicle
13: Spotted Owl Identification, Cornell Lab: All About Birds
14: Spotted Owl Range Map, Cornell Lab: All About Birds
15: Friends of Animals sues FWS to stop the disastrous slaughter of 450,000 barred owls, Friends of Animals
16: Environmental groups sue to stop USFWS plan to killed barred owls, Statesman Journal
The Northern American Owl Blogs 20, 2024
Oh, hi there. So, you spotted me! Get it? You spotted Strix occidentalis, the Spotted Owl! Ha ha! Well, actually God spotted me -- or evolution or whatever.
I don't know why I should be joking around like this, though. I've got plenty to worry about.
Loggers hate me here in the Pacific Northwest. They've been sore ever since the US Fish & Wildlife Service gave me Endangered Species status in 19901. The locals want the right to cut down old-growth forest as they see fit, and since such forest is my natural habitat, I am their bete noire, so to speak, the owl that they love to hate. I don't want to say that they are cold hearted, but let's put it this way: they keep telling people that we Spotted Owls taste like chicken2. The very idea! And so I am caught in an ongoing political tug-of-war between environmentalists and loggers3.
Properly speaking, of course, the anger of those loggers is mainly directed at only one of the three subspecies of Spotted Owl in the States, namely the Northern Spotted Owl (Strix occidentalis caurina). But my two stateside cousins are facing problems of their own. Both the California Spotted Owl (Strix occidentalis occidentalis) and the Mexican Spotted Owl (Strix occidentalis lucida) are threatened by high-severity wildfires4. According to the Audubon Society, "Destructive megafires burned more of their habitat in 2020 and 2021 alone than in the previous 35 years5."
And then there's the invader from the east. Both we California and Northern subspecies of Spotted Owl have to deal with the Barred Owl that has been horning in on our habitat since the mid-1900s6. It used to be a purely eastern species but has been moving west of late, apparently thanks in part to the changes wrought in the North American landscape by European settlers7.
The Barred Owl is a species of our own Strix genus, you understand, and that's a problem. There is a reason why owl species of the same genus are not generally found in the same area. It's because they both end up competing for the same environmental niche. And that's just what happened when Barred Owls joined us Spotted Owls in the self-same territory.
No sooner had we Northern Spotted Owls received federal protection, than the similar-looking Barred Owls started outcompeting us on every front. They are more aggressive than yours truly, they lay more eggs than yours truly, they require less territory than yours truly, and they are less finicky eaters than yours truly. They are even taller than yours truly, if only by an inch or so8.
And what was the result of this strigophile mismatch? What else? Our Spotted Owl numbers started plummeting.
Journalist Franz Lidz summed up this dismal situation as follows in his 2024 New York Times article entitled "They Shoot Owls in California, Don't They?"
"Northern Spotted Owl populations have declined by up to 80 percent over the last two decades. As few as 3,000 remain on federal lands, compared with 12,000 in the 1990s.9"
The author reports in the same article that the population of Canadian Spotted Owls in British Columbia, just north of my stateside territory, is down to one. That's right, one. And I don't mean one pair, either, I mean one single Spotted Owl, a female, as it turns out.
"If the trend continues," writes Lidz, "the northern Spotted Owl could become the first owl subspecies in the United States to go extinct."
There it is, folks, the dreaded "E" word.
Now maybe you can see why the Fish & Wildlife Service has come up with a plan to kill 15,000 Barred Owls per year over the next 30 years. That's a total of 450,000 Barred Owls10.
That may sound extreme, but the agency says that the culling operation will affect less than one-half of 1% of the current North American Barred Owl population11.
That shows you just how populous and resilient my rival is.
But the plan is not without its critics.
In the words of Wayne Pacelle, president of Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy:
"The Fish and Wildlife Service is proposing the largest-ever plan to slaughter raptors anywhere in the world, and by a country mile.... The agency is stepping onto a killing treadmill that it can never dismount12."
Wow! Then there's THAT, huh? What a to-do!
With all this drama going on, I will have to stay up at night thinking of ways to keep this blog from sounding gloomy. Good job that I am already a night owl by habit13. But how do I accent the positive when I am on the verge of extinction?
Well, I suppose I can always close my blog entries with a joke. Let's see now...
Why can't Strix occidentalis play hide-and-seek?
Because we're always spotted!
Get it? Because we're always SPOTTED? Ha ha!
Editor's Note: Ouch! Um... okay. Thanks, Lady Spotswood.
Permit me to add a link to help your fans keep Strix occidentalis straight when it comes to subspecies.
This map at the Cornell Lab website shows the territories that each of the three Spotted Owl subspecies calls home14. The Northern subspecies predominates in the Pacific Northwest, the California subspecies in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and the Mexican subspecies in the forested mountains and canyonlands of Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, and Colorado.
Also, I should point out that there is a new wrinkle in the debate over culling the Barred Owl to the tune of 15,000 birds per year in the Pacific Northwest. In a November 2024 post, the group Friends of Animals states that there is new evidence showing that Barred Owls have inhabited the Pacific Northwest for thousands of years. They claim that the agency downplayed that possibility in their Environmental Impact Statement. Friends of Animals is suing the Fish & Wildlife Service over the culling plan15, as are Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy16.
1: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lists northern spotted owl as threatened on June 23, 1990., HistoryLink.org
2: The spotted owl made the rich richer, High Country News
3: A delicate balance: the controversial plan to protect the spotted owl, Salish Current
4: California Spotted Owl, National Park Service
5: Fire Is a Major Threat to California Spotted Owls, Audubon
6: Spotted Owl and Barred Owl, Redwood National and State Parks California
7: Barred Owl Management, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
8: Spotted Owl and Barred Owl, Redwood National and State Parks California
9: They Shoot Owls in California, Don't They?, The New York Times
10: Barred Owl Management Strategy Final EIS FAQs, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
11: Environment Plan finalized to kill thousands of barred owls around Northwest, Washington State Standard
12: Environment Plan finalized to kill thousands of barred owls around Northwest, Oregon Capital Chronicle
13: Spotted Owl Identification, Cornell Lab: All About Birds
14: Spotted Owl Range Map, Cornell Lab: All About Birds
15: Friends of Animals sues FWS to stop the disastrous slaughter of 450,000 barred owls, Friends of Animals
16: Environmental groups sue to stop USFWS plan to killed barred owls, Statesman Journal
copyright 2024 by Brian Quass.
contact: quass@quass.com.