Defenders Magazine

On the Ground: Relocating Owls: Lock, Stock and Burrow

By Heidi Ridgley

© U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

It's 6 a.m. just outside Phoenix and Bob Fox is up to his chest in a dirt hole. Blindly, he thrusts his arm into a side tunnel of the burrow he's uncovered and gropes. Then comes the unmistakable warning rattle. With ungloved hands, he braces himself and grabs hold.

The bite is painful, but Fox hangs on. He's relieved to find that the hissing creature he holds—whose distress call sounds exactly like a rattlesnake's—has feathers, not scales. And although the owl's beak packs a powerful peck, it doesn't contain venom.

Clearly, the creature fighting for its life is not happy to see him, but it should be. For more than a decade Fox and his wife, Sam, have been relocating burrowing owls—the only owl in the world that lives in the abandoned shelters of small mammals such as prairie dogs and ground squirrels. This propensity puts the six-ounce, 10-inch-tall species at risk of being buried alive by bulldozers in ever-expanding parts of its range in the West, particularly in Arizona and California.

But the Foxes, founders of Wild At Heart, a raptor rehabilitation center on the outskirts of Phoenix, have found a way that could keep this imperiled bird off the endangered species list. Their strategy is to work with land developers—instead of against them.

"Given all the publicity with the spotted owl in the Northwest and the cactus ferruginous pygmy owl here, developers often panic when they see owls because they think if they tell anyone, their project will get shut down or delayed," says Fox. "But we've been able to show developers we can get the necessary permits from fish and wildlife quickly and get the birds out without disrupting construction schedules or costing the company massive amounts of money."

It also helps developers avoid a community battle. "Because these owls look cute and personable, residents in an area can become very attached," says Fox. "If they see that a particular project will bury the owls alive, it can suddenly turn into a public relations nightmare for a developer."

That's why more companies are turning to Wild At Heart if they suspect—or are told by state officials—that burrowing owls live on property slated for development. "I've worked with them two or three times and it was definitely worth it," says Greg Hahn, president of G&K South 40 Development in Mesa, Arizona. "The public was happy that the owls were relocated to new homes and it only took a few days to remove them."

The group's success resulted in a partnership with Defenders of Wildlife to develop a manual on owl relocation. The goal is to get California officials to adopt the plan as part of their overall conservation strategy for burrowing owls, since 91 percent of the state's estimated 9,450 nesting pairs live on private land vulnerable to development. "Currently the California Department of Fish and Game does not allow ‘active' owl relocation but instead requires developers to ‘passively relocate' owls by collapsing their empty burrows," says Kim Delfino, California program director at Defenders of Wildlife, which along with other conservation groups in 2003 unsuccessfully petitioned California officials to list the owl as an endangered species. "We hope outlining Wild at Heart's active relocation work in Arizona will show state agencies in California that it's possible to successfully relocate owls to protected lands."

Although classified as a bird of conservation concern by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, considered a species of special concern in California and protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, the burrowing owl continues to decline in California by about 8 percent a year, with the number of known breeding colonies declining by nearly 60 percent since the 1980s. One reason is that the owls are strongly attached to nesting sites and are not easily persuaded to move.

Wild At Heart, however, has found a way to make the owls commit. It's not quick but it does stick. Between 2002 and early 2005, the group relocated nearly 500 burrowing owls to more than 30 sites throughout Arizona, with 80 percent of these sites—often parks—hosting owls that produce offspring.

The process begins with Fox scouring the targeted area for droppings and feathers. When he finds a burrow, which can be five feet deep, 50 feet long and have 10 openings, he blocks all but one of the holes. When the owls return to the burrow, he's able to catch some using a tube trap he's placed in the entry. He catches others using a hoop with netting that the owl pulls over itself when it tries to snatch mouse bait. To ensure there aren't any owls hiding deep in the chamber, he excavates the entire burrow by hand. That's when things can get dicey.

"I can't use gloves because that makes it impossible to feel the owls," he says. The result: He's experienced the shock and squish of a cold, wet Colorado River toad, had a cottontail run up his arm, came flesh to scale with a snake and has felt the bite and sting of spiders and scorpions—many times.

More often than not, though, he ends up with owls in hand and heads off to Wild At Heart's aviaries, where the birds stay for a minimum of 60 days. "This is the necessary step that breaks fidelity to the home territory," he says. "If we released them right away, they'd fly right back to where they came from."

Meanwhile, volunteers go to work building a network of artificial burrows on safe and suitable ground. Before the owls arrive the site is enclosed with netting to ensure the relocated owls take to their new digs. The screens stay put for a month.

The same isn't true for Fox, who is either back at the aviaries tending to more owls and other raptors-in-need with his wife and volunteers or he's back digging up a new burrow before the next round of bulldozers break ground.