The Owl USTREAM video

I don't know if you have noticed the owls at the bottom of my blog.  It's a real time video of an owl nesting box in Oceanside, CA.  This is all new to me, but a woman I work with was ga-ga over this owl family last year, and this year I started watching it.  It's a USTREAM - I guess like a small camera that goes 24/7 and records what's going on.  I'd love to have one in my condo during the day so I could see what Katie is doing.  Kind of like a Nanny Cam.

Anyway, this female owl, Sydney sits in the nest and over a couple of weeks lays 7 eggs. Aproximately every other day.  Six have hatched, one was not viable.  During the night the male owl, Mel, brings her food, like mice, gophers, rabbits, etc.  Now that she has baby owls, she feeds them and is teaching them to feed themselves.  I've learned so much from the woman at work and the comment section on the side of the streaming video.  These are beautiful birds, and their babies look like prehistoric animals.  Dinosaur birds.

 Here's Sydney with an owlet peeking out.

 Sydney is moving around.  You can see unhatched eggs and some owlets.

When this photo was captured, there were three babies and three eggs.

Notice the food that Mel brought her during the night.

During the day it's clear and very interesting, the night cam isn't as good, but they are still pretty active.  Poor Sydney, she was sitting on these seven eggs, all was well, now they are hatched and getting bigger every day, starting to grow feathers, wiggling around constantlly, and every time she sits down, one of them is popping out a head or a tail.  Sometimes it's really funny! : )

The box starts out plain wood, but as you can see, she now has a soft lining of fur for her babies to nestle in.  You don't wanna know!  Unless you have a strong stomach or a real interest in the way birds nest.  But it is fascinating.  Nature is wierd and wonderful.

That's it for today - from me and Katie, have a great Wednesday, everyone! : )