Saw-whet owls have yellow eyes, white faces, white-speckled heads, and mottled brown feathers. Small birds that only weigh 2.3-5.3 ounces and stand 7.1-8.3 inches, they tend to eat mice. An adult mouse will sometimes last a saw-whet owl two meals.

Usually found in forests, the saw-whet owl is one of the most common owls in North America. Very nocturnal, they are rarely seen but frequently heard. They repeatedly make shrill too-too-too calls. They were even named for their call, which sounds like a “saw being sharpened on a whetting stone.” Drumlin Farm participates in banding projects in the fall, and the owls are caught by playing a tape of saw-whet calls that lures them into a net. Listen to a recordings of different saw-whet owl calls from the Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

When raising young, the male exclusively hunts and the female exclusively incubates and cares for the babies. The female leaves the nest when the youngest is 18 days old, but the male continues to bring food to the owlets for the next 10-14 days, until the babies fledge. During this time without the mother, the previously spotless nest turns into a pigsty, with feces, pellets, and rotting prey parts. Occasionally, when prey is plentiful, males have broods with multiple females at the same time.

Participants in a children’s program pose with a saw-whet owl from our Wildlife Care facility.

You can experience saw-whet owls for yourself during our adult program, An Evening with Saw-whet Owls. You will get to know New England’s smallest native owl with a short discussion and slideshow before heading out for some banding! Register online today to secure your spot, or call our program registrar at 781-259-2206.

Guest author Libby Koger is a Drumlin Farm volunteer. Information from: http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Barred_Owl/id. Recording from the Macaulay Library, at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

Information from: http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Northern_Saw-whet_Owl/id

Barred owls are mottled brown and white, and have dark brown eyes. They usually live in old forests, because there is a wide variety of prey and the trees are large enough for nesting. They also often live near water, be it a stream or a swamp.

Barred owls eat a variety of animals, like mice, rabbits, amphibians, reptiles and fish. Barred owls either dive for fish or wade in the shallows and catch them. They usually hunt at night. Sometimes, they store their food and eat it during the day.

These owls don’t migrate, and rarely even leave their territory. They are quite aggressive towards intruders. While their nests are vulnerable to hawks, raccoons, weasels, and other owls, adult barred owls are only threatened by Great Horned Owls.

Their call is famous for sounding like “Who cooks for you?” Make sure you listen for it on your next nature walk!

Guest author Libby Koger is a Drumlin Farm volunteer. Information from: http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Barred_Owl/id. Recording from the Macaulay Library, at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

We grow several varieties of eggplant at Drumlin Farm including black eggplant (the traditional variety), oriental eggplant (long and skinny), and rosa bianca (round and mostly white). Each one is unique in shape and color, but all are equally delicious, whether baked, sautéed, grilled, or roasted.

Can’t decide what to do with your eggplant? Try this recipe for eggplant parmigiana!

Nana’s Eggplant Parmigiana

Family recipes are known for their ambiguity, and this traditional dish passed down through my family for generations is no exception. Nana’s eggplant recipe is chock full of “a little of this” and “as much of that as you need.” For those of you who need precise measurements, please proceed to your nearest cookbook. Anyone up for a delectable cooking adventure, read on!

Ingredients

• Eggplant—generally, 2 medium-sized eggplants fill an 8×8 square baking dish. Your quantity depends on the size of your dish and your eggplants.
• Tomatoes—my Nana uses a 28 oz can of whole tomatoes. You could also start from fresh tomatoes and add tomato juice, salt, and basil to make the marinara.
• Basil
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• garlic powder
• About 1 cup of flour
• 2-3 eggs per eggplant
• Grated Parmesan cheese
• Shredded or sliced mozzarella cheese
• Extra virgin olive oil
• salt and black pepper to taste

Directions

Prepare the Eggplant

1. Peel your eggplants and cut into thin, even, round slices.
2. Lay them flat between layers of paper towel. Cover with a final paper towel, and press your eggplant slices with something heavy for at least 4 hours. This step is crucial for taking out the moisture that makes eggplant bitter. Stacks of cookbooks, a full tea kettle, or kitchen appliances work well. If you can, leave them to press overnight—the more water your press out, the less bitter the eggplant will be.

Make Marinara

1. Saute your onions in about 2 tbs of olive oil.
2. Puree the tomatoes until no chunks remain. Once your onions are translucent, add the tomato purée.
3. Add garlic powder, salt, and basil to taste. My Nana adds “a lot” of garlic powder, which I imagine to be 6-7 shakes of the bottle.
4. Simmer on low for 25 minutes.

Fry the Eggplant

1. Whisk the eggs with Parmesan cheese, salt and pepper to make an egg dip. Put the flour into a separate small bowl nearby for dusting. Alternatively, you can put the flour in a Ziploc bag and use the “shake method” to dust several slices at once.
2. Add enough olive oil to cover the bottom of your frying pan “without drowning the eggplant slices.” It’s a little less than a 1/4 inch layer. Heat the oil on medium heat.
3. When the oil is ready, (“you’ll know by flicking a tiny amount of flour into the pan—if it sizzles, the oil is ready”) dust the eggplant with flour, then coat with the egg dip, and add to the pan. It helps to prepare several slices in the egg dip at once before moving them to the frying pan so that they all fry at the same time.
4. Fry each slice for 1-2 minutes on each side until the outside is a light golden brown.
5. Lay finished eggplant on more sheets of paper towel to soak up extra oil.
6. Repeat until all the slices are fried. You may need to add more oil to the pan, more eggs to your egg dip, or more flour to your bowl as you see fit.

Put it all together

1. Layer the eggplant with marinara and mozzarella cheese in your baking dish. My Nana uses sliced cheese, but here I used the shredded kind.
2. Bake for 20 minutes until all the cheese is melted at 350°F.

And voilà! Authentic Italian eggplant parmigiana. Enjoy!

Meet the newest addition to the farmyard—Samson!

Samson is a domestic rabbit brought to Drumlin Farm with the hope of increasing opportunities for our program participants to touch and interact with our animals. He is still in training, but we are very excited to add Samson to our on-site and outreach programs.

For now, you can visit Samson at the Poultry House. Be sure to stop by on your next visit to welcome Samson to Drumlin Farm!

The Eastern screech owl is found “wherever there are trees,” from woods to parks to your backyard.

Eastern screech owl pairs usually nest together for life. However, occasionally a male will mate with two females. The second female will usually evict the first and raise both sets of eggs as her own. With that being said, there have been instances of two females and a male all nesting together.

Owlets fledge after about 30 days, but, as they are developing their flying and hunting techniques, they continue to rely on their parents for food for the next 8-10 weeks.

Very well camouflaged to look like tree bark by their gray or reddish-brown feathers, screech owls are much easier to spot by sound than by sight. They make a distinctive “trilling or whinnying” sound. Hear it for yourself on the recording below from the Macaulay Library, at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology!

Screech owls eat many different insects, small mammals, and songbirds. Starlings, Blue Jays, and Chickadees sometimes purposely annoy the nearby screech owls to displace them. They often succeed, thereby alerting all the other birds in the area to the presence of the owls.

Guest author Libby Koger is a Drumlin Farm volunteer. Information from: http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Eastern_Screech-Owl/id