So...yesterday, I heard THE mockingbird! The way he changes sounds so quickly, I'm not really thinking he's the mystery bird now. Especially since the mystery bird makes his one sound over and over. Catherine, it's a monotone, for sure. It's usually 2 "teets", separated by a pause, then many "teets" in a row before pausing and starting over. It appears to be speeding up, but now my memory is fading. It's been so long since I've heard it as close to the house as it was the first 2 days. It's a strong sound, not very high pitched, just solid. I have absolutely nothing to compare it to, so I'm sorry for the vague descriptions! As I mentioned earlier, the tempo of the song of the vermilion flycatcher is VERY similar, albeit it's MUCH more high-pitched than the mystery bird's. (I just listened to the song on the Cornell site, and it sounds nothing like the vermilion song in my book - "The repeated territorial song of the male Vermilion Flycatcher!" Ack!) DH did say the bird was a tad smaller than our scrub jays. He said the tail appeared black on the top with "some white underneath"....although trying to view anything against the harsh glare of the sky is NOT very accurate. LOL Thanks for continuing to try, ladies!! The wind is here until Friday, so I may not get another chance to see it until then. :( Brenda

That's "Twister" - a baby screech owl. He looked a lot better after he had a bath.

I love seeing Barred owls, and have seen them very few times. The babies are adorable. I envy you.

and people don't want to wade through all that. Gratifying that you enjoyed it. I never had seen an owl close up like that even in a zoo, saw one in my tree high up that had ticked off about 15 crows, no camera lens I had then or now that would reach that far, they have to come to me lol. It is truly those eyes. How I wanted to adopt it, but I knew that would be selfish and the animal control people could have made things extremely difficult for me if they got wind of it. My son said, "Mom, why don't you just take it in and feed it." I might have done that, but gambeled (wish they had a spell checker, I'm getting bad) that it would be better off in the wild. You have no idea of the anguish I felt when it got on that wire, worried that it would get on the hot one. But I knew that it was stronger to get up there which meant it must have been getting some nourishment. I had dreams of training my own owl, have a leather shield made for my arm for it to perch on like those falconers in the old books and movies had. Maybe in another life? I try not to entertain such thoughts, but sure would like to meet up with it again in a better world. I kept a little feather that stuck to my clothes so I know it belonged to that owl that I put in the envelope of little things I want buried with me, along with a clipping of my favorite cat's fur. Now that is silly, isn't it? A hanky I gave my grandmother when I was little, silly little things, I'm not through yet lol. Really, the only aid I gave it was keep it off the ground so a dog wouldn't get it or the neighbor kids get to fooling with it, tried to keep it quiet around here, but finally a few got wind of it and were quite fascinated. I also have two owl feathers I picked up in the yard and put them in a small pottery vase one of my children made in school. I like that. I'll finish my silly story. I'm sitting in the one a/c room, finally turned it on, it is sizzling hot and humid, and I hear a ruckus outside, open the window and see three kids in my apple tree going for the green apples. Can anyone relate? I told them to come down from the tree, it wasn't safe. So I go get my apple picker, went out in the heat, and got them each a green apple, one wanted two and bigger, of course. I told them they were sour. They only wanted them because they were hard to get to. They will be back when they think I'm not looking lol. I hate to be like that, but because of lawsuits and parents, I don't want kids getting hurt on my property even if I have insurance. Some people just go for as deep pockets as they can find . . .a different world out there.