From Barry Buttle
A series of photos i captured a couple of weeks ago of a Kestrel surprising a Barn Owl from behind and taking a vole it had caught, the Barn Owl looks at the Kestrel in disgust.
Waiting for the movie Retribution, starring Liam Owlson.
OMG, I was thinking Liam could play a good owl, but I found a clip of him teaming up with an owl to get revenge already!
Haha, best version of the Naked Gun!
I haven’t seen it, but that scene was ridiculous! 😆
Hahaha, OMG, gave me a good chuckle!
Me too! I never would have guessed that existed. 🤣
Are barn owls that small?! Is that really the size comparison? I would have thought it were a merlin or peregrine based on how big I assumed barn owls were!
Very cool photos! Were you in an open field? I rarely have enough continuous sky above me to see much of the frequent red-tail & crow battles above me.
Barn owls (at least the ones most of us think of) are medium sized owls. This is a Tyto alba, a Western barn owl, which averages 13-14 inches / 33-35cm and a weight from 400-700 grams. The Tasmania masked owl is the largest barn owl, and is maybe 25-50% larger.
Kestrels are about the same size in length and wingspan, but are 150-250 grams, so in that regard, they are much smaller than a barn owl.
Here is a thumbnail for a nest cam video of a female kestrel attempting a raid on a barn owl nest. This is a female kestrel fighting the male barn owl. With raptors, the females are around 25-30% larger than males on average, so this is a larger kestrel vs a smaller barn owl and I think the width of the barnie is pretty visible here.
If you watch the clip, the owl doesn’t have too much difficulty maintaining physical control over the kesterl. There’s no visible gore in the video, though the description notes the kestrel was injured. It goes choppy when the owl really tries to put the hurt on the kestrel, so you can mainly just see them wrestling.
With a snatch and grab like in the original post photo, the kestrel should be at an advantage with its speed and agility advantage over the owl.
That’s an amazing video. Those barns have even more lurking Miyazaki “no-face” energy than expected… https://www.instagram.com/p/DChgW1KKBp3/
I’m totally fascinated by the size comparisons, both how similar they can be and how divergent on the opposite extremes. But your comment and that video also really highlight the varied advantages they each have. In close quarters, those beaks and claws completely overpower the kestral! Wow.
I’m glad that was helpful!
That kestrel got in a real bad position with those owls and she was lucky to get out of there. That one bite looked like it could have been nasty!
You dick!
Mr. Tyto has been kind enough to bring us a snack. Be my guest. Help yourselves. Get a good one.
