Description
A barred owl in the last warm light of the day, sitting on a mossy perch with his eyes nearly closed and his head tipped slightly down. Golden light on the breast, cool blue winter woods behind. I know I am reading a human expression onto a bird — but this one looks like it is grieving something.
When I first posted this photograph I gave it a caption: don’t kill me, I’m just trying to survive like everyone else. That is not a throwaway line. Barred owls in the Pacific Northwest are the subject of a federal removal program — large-scale, long-term, and lethal — intended to protect the northern spotted owl, which they outcompete in old-growth forest.
I want to be fair about it, because the people who wrote that plan are not villains. The spotted owl is in genuine danger of blinking out, we caused that by logging its forests, and once barred owls arrive in the remaining fragments the spotted owls lose. Wildlife managers are facing a real and awful arithmetic with no clean answer in it.
But the barred owl did not do anything wrong. It was not released here like the nutria or stocked like the carp; it flew west on its own wings, through country we reshaped, and settled where the living was possible. That is what every species does, humans very much included. Whatever the right policy turns out to be, it is worth sitting with the fact that this particular animal — asleep in the evening sun on a mossy branch in Portland — is doing nothing but existing.
Some photographs are funny. This one I keep coming back to for other reasons.
This is a high-resolution digital download of the photograph, made in Portland, Oregon — yours to print for your home or office, set as a wallpaper, or simply keep.
What you’ll receive: a high-resolution JPEG, approximately 3424 × 2464 pixels — sharp enough to print at full photo quality up to about 11 × 8 inches at 300 DPI, and larger at normal wall viewing distances. Delivered as an instant download the moment your order is complete.
License: Personal use only. Print it for your own home, use it as a wallpaper or screen background, enjoy it yourself. Not licensed for commercial use, resale, redistribution, or AI training. © Jonathan Swanson / JonSwan Productions. All rights reserved.