Today we had a serious encounter with the short-eared owl. In order to convince the feathered creature to walk closer to us (an owl will walk but never run) we requested that our guests mimic all movements and behavior of the bird…so we got it ten feet closer as twelve faces were moving in vertical circles anticlockwise. Then we got it twenty feet closer as we turned our neck 180 degrees both westward and eastward (this was not that easy). But the difficult part came when the clawed raptor decided on its own to take a short flight (this we didn't follow completely) and to our surprise caught a storm petrel out of the blue. It soon landed (to our behavior-mimicking relief) and we got it about thirty feet closer as we removed the feathers from our backpacks with our claws and started eating its contents..
- Daily Expedition Reports
- 04 May 2000
From the Polaris in the Galapagos, 5/4/2000, National Geographic Polaris
- Aboard the National Geographic Polaris
- Galápagos
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