Owls Come Out at Night

While you are getting ready for bed, an owl is just waking up! Owls are nocturnal, which means they sleep during the day and are awake and hunting at night.

By the end of this lesson you will be able to: - Tell what nocturnal means - Explain why owls have such big eyes - Describe how an owl can fly without making noise - Sort animals into awake in the day and awake at night groups

An owl's eyes are huge compared to the rest of its head, almost as big as a human eye, even though an owl's whole body is much smaller than a person! Big eyes let in much more light, which helps owls see even when it is very dark outside. Owls can't roll their eyes around like we can, so instead they turn their whole head, sometimes almost all the way around, to look in a new direction.

Most birds' wings make a soft whooshing sound when they flap, which is why you can sometimes hear a pigeon fly past you. Owls have special feathers with soft, comb-like fringes on the edges that break up the air and muffle the sound of flapping. This lets an owl swoop down on a mouse or a vole without the little animal ever hearing it coming.

Some owls, like the barn owl, have ears placed at slightly different heights on each side of their head. Sound reaches one ear a tiny fraction of a second before the other, and the owl's brain uses that tiny difference to figure out exactly where a sound is coming from. This is so precise that a barn owl can catch a mouse in total darkness, using hearing alone.