Description
An adult western screech owl leaning out of his cavity in low afternoon light, one amber eye locked on something below, talons hooked over the lip of the hole. Whatever he is watching — a mouse in the leaf litter, a vole crossing open ground — he has clearly decided it is worth getting up for.
Note the feet, because the feet are the weapon. Owls do not kill with the beak; they kill with the talons, striking feet-first and closing on the prey with a grip that is startling for a bird this size — a screech owl is barely eight inches tall and weighs about as much as a baseball, and it routinely takes rodents, songbirds and large insects. The beak is only used afterward, for dismantling anything too big to swallow whole.
Most of the time nothing gets dismantled at all. Small prey goes down whole, and head-first — the head-first part matters, because it folds the limbs the right way and stops fur and feet from catching on the way down. Everything indigestible is compacted in a second stomach and coughed back up hours later as a pellet, which is how you find an owl’s roost long after the owl has moved on.
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 4192 × 2368 pixels in a wide crop — sharp enough to print at full photo quality up to about 14 × 8 inches at 300 DPI, and considerably larger for wall display. 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.