Barred owls are one of the most common species of owl found in Louisiana, and researchers from the university have been looking into how the distinctively vocal birds affect the Baton Rouge community.
Associate Professor at the LSU School of Renewable Natural Resources Sabrina Taylor and P.h.D. candidate Vitek Jirinec have been studying barred owls and how they affect everyday life in Baton Rouge.
Barred owls are the most abundant species of owls found in Baton Rouge and one of the most common raptors in Louisiana. Taylor and Jirinec said they have been studying their home ranges and how they utilize the resources in their habitats.
“This is not anyone’s research, per se, it’s essentially a collection of professors and students who decided to take this on,” Jirinec said.
Jirinec said barred owls live in large, mature trees and span from east Texas to Canada but especially like swamp forests. In Baton Rouge, they can be commonly found at BREC Parks, Bluebonnet Swamp and anywhere that is densely forested.
Taylor also said they have a unique urban habitat and so their study also looked at how they use their urban habitats. They actually help with pest control in the city because they eat rodents, snakes and even crawfish, providing for “free ecosystem services” according to Jirinec.
“They are everywhere but at the same time, people are not seeing them as much because they are these elusive, nocturnal raptors,” Jirinec said.
Taylor said the researchers caught and put GPS tags, similar to a FitBit, on the owls and tracked their movements throughout the day and night. Their ultimate goal was to see how forest fragment size affects daytime and nighttime owls. They noticed barred owls have a very small home range and don’t travel very far at all.
“These guys are homebodies,” Jirinec said.
One particular owl, which they named Ragnar, caught their attention when they noticed he had two “home ranges.” The researchers noticed heavy activity in two spots: near St. Gabriel all the way to north of LSU’s campus, where he spent some time in the winter. They said that was atypical for a Barred Owl.
“The resource availability drops quite a bit in the winter,” Jirinec said. “So you don’t have crawfish, amphibians and reptiles hiding. Mammals, like rodents, might be the most dominant source at that time.”
Jirinec said the LSU community should grow to appreciate barred owls more in everyday life.
“If you’re utilitarian, they provide a service to us for free,” Jirinec said. “We have to make the environment more inviting for them.”
Other schools around the country have also been studying barred owls so Taylor and Jirinec compare data from different regions to see how different environments affect the owls’ behaviors. They did say however that LSU has conducted the largest studies on barred owls.
“We have more birds and advanced data than anyone else does,” Taylor said.
The researchers said as more technology is developed, they hope to learn more about these rodent-controlling raptors. According to Taylor, the best place to try and catch a glimpse of these fascinating creatures is at Bluebonnet Swamp.
