It was a quieter day at the Scottish Owl Centre today, with the Easter school break over and many people back at work again. We did get some visitors though, including a group who arrived to see one of our flying displays.
For the first display I decided to try Hudson in his first appearance with an audience. He has been flying well in training apart from his distraction due to the speaker system. I thought a small audience and speakers switched off would be a fair chance for him to get used to one thing before the whole works. I thought wrong.
Hudson weighed in lighter than the last time I flew him myself, so he should have been ready and eager. For some reason he just wasn’t in the zone. He didn’t seem fussed that there were strange people in the arena, but he still wasn’t interested in flying, or food. So that was a bit of a let down! Oh well, he just wasn’t ready. Everyone has an off day.
Lofty and Sarabi weren’t on their best form either, but at least they flew!
As usual, the lunchtime line up of Hosking the Tawny Owl, Bruce the Boobook Owl, and Oulu the Great Grey Owl wowed the audience and everyone went away smiling.
The afternoon was quieter, with no visitors for the flying display, so I flew Prince the Ashy Faced Owl anyway. It was a shame there was no audience as he was amazing, flew just where I wanted him to go every time. He flew long down the length of the arena, up to the corner perch, across to the opposite corner, repeatedly. He flew diagonally over the benches to land on my glove each way I could think of. Prince was a little star! He’s now officially promoted to my favourite owl again after going off the rails a little. He still needs a bit of socialising on the glove so I hope to spend a little time with him on walkabout as often as I can, plus fly him in the displays. How ironic that the best bird I flew today was Prince and there was nobody else to appreciate it!
In other news our elderly Long-eared Owl is still with us despite the odds. She had eaten overnight and ate again today. I don’t see that she is improving or recovering, but have to admire the strength of her will to live. As long as she keeps on trying then I will too. Tonight she is indoors again with food cut into pieces for her should she want it.
Anyway I’m signing off and will check on her first thing. ‘Til tomorrow, gnite.
