Barn Owl Blogs

Images of cannibalism evoke range of responses

By Tina Phillips

The Birdhouse Network's Nest Box Cams have brought images of the family life of birds to thousands of viewers through the Internet. Highlights from a nest box in Texas this year show Barn Owls mating and preening one another, and even multi-tasking, such as when the female held a gift of a rat from the male in her beak while incubating eggs and allowing him to mate with her. The cams have also shown challenges these owls face, including the death of young birds. This year, the cams recorded two instances of cannibalism by Barn Owls. Cannibalism is fairly common among birds of prey after a chick dies, presumably because it's a way to recover added nutrition.

Viewing uncensored and often graphic images is fascinating for some, uncomfortable for most, and downright disturbing for others. Interestingly, viewers posted different reactions to two instances of cannibalism by Barn Owls, possibly because some had witnessed the events through live still images, while others had seen the chronology unfold through live streaming video. On April 18, viewers watched in real-time streaming video as a female Barn Owl in Texas picked up her dying chick in her bill. We believe that the one-day old chick, unable to control its body temperature, became too hot during the intense heat that plagued Texas in mid-April. When the chick did not respond after several minutes, the female consumed it. As I watched online, I began dreading what I thought would be a deluge of comments from viewers describing the female as brutal or savage. To my surprise, those comments never came. One viewer wrote on the blog page, "I've read about this [cannibalism] happening, but never expected to see it! I tuned in at 4:30 to witness the mother poking the baby chick, trying to get it up; then wham! She started to tear its head apart. I didn't realize at first whether it was a rodent or the chick. I knew it died, but not why until I read your replies."

Images from streaming video. The Barn Owl held the lifeless chick in her bill for a few minutes before consuming it. Below, the two surviving owlets stand in a relaxed position. They are about six-and-a-half weeks old. Barn Owls usually fledge in about nine weeks.

Two days later, Nest Box Cam posted still images of a female Barn Owl in California trying to feed the youngest of her four chicks, which we believe had not been able to get enough food. A few minutes after the chick died, the female dismembered it and fed it to the three surviving owlets. Unlike the streaming video cam in Texas, the California cam uploads still frame images every 30 seconds. Viewers wrote in with a lengthy string of comments about whether or not the staff should have intervened in an attempt to save the owlet. One viewer wrote, "This was not a sickly/weak inactive owlet. I found it to have great character and will to live . . . the mother's attention in its last moments was a bittersweet scene to behold . . . a loving good bye."

Why were comments on the still shots from the California cam more emotional and anthropomorphic, even though the video footage from Texas was more graphic? It's possible that the observers may have responded differently just by chance, or that the audiences were somehow different. However, the messages were typical of others posted to the site and a recent survey revealed that the audiences were generally similar. About 43 percent of those polled viewed both still and video cams at least once a day, and 47 percent enjoyed watching them equally.

Is it possible that viewers' reactions were influenced by whether they observed the events through streaming video versus still frame photos? For every second of imagery recorded by the cam in California, there are 29 seconds that are unobservable, for which people must make their own inferences. The Texas cam, however, enabled viewers to see the context of the dying chick in its entirety, giving them more information on which to base observations.

We suspected that the blogs would provide a forum for an online learning community, and they do. We didn't expect that the way in which the cams are displayed might influence the way viewers perceive and interpret animal behavior. In the case of the owls, context may matter, and in addition to intrigue and access, the technology of streaming video also has provided meaningful context within which to study and interpret animal behavior.

To read the blogs or look at archived images, visit the Nest Box Cam at www.birds.cornell.edu/birdhouse. To help fund streaming video for Nest Box Cam, see Support Streaming Video .

For permission to reprint all or part of this article, please contact Laura Erickson, editor, Cornell Lab of Ornithology, 159 Sapsucker Woods Rd., Ithaca, NY, 14850. Phone: (607) 254-1114. email: lle24@cornell.edu