this post was submitted on 05 Aug 2024
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From the Ojai Raptor Center

Meet adult Great Horned Owl (GHOW) Patient 24-502, affectionately nicknamed "Skunk-boy" by our hospital staff. Owls, like most other birds of prey, do not have a strongly developed sense of smell. It's not uncommon for us to receive Red-tailed Hawk or Great Horned Owl patients reeking of skunk. At least we can assume they are less bothered by it than we are!

Aside from his skunky scent, 24-502 was admitted with eye trauma and a wing droop. Both are healing, and he has already graduated to an outdoor enclosure where his flight continues to improve daily. As you can see when GHOW 24-502 is not being physically restrained by one of our hospital technicians for an exam as he is in the first photo, he immediately takes a defensive posture of fanning out his wings and looking fierce! As apex predators, these owls need to be in order to secure their place in the ecosystem. 24-502 is obviously pretty good at striking this pose and we can't wait to return him to the wild asap.

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[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 19 points 3 months ago (2 children)
[–] FierySpectre@lemmy.world 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Nice contrast with how menacing he looks in the other pics haha. This one is straight up cute

[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 3 points 3 months ago

The anger was really just a cry for a hug! 😁

[–] FuglyDuck@lemmy.world 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

it amazes me this is the same owl. Not because of the crazy/cute thing, but because of the difference in size.

This guy has a lot of floof. Like. i'm kinda jealous.

[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 2 points 3 months ago

Indeed!

Even non-puffed, owls are already 40-60% air by volume.

Here's a good full puff video

[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 16 points 3 months ago
[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 16 points 3 months ago
[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 16 points 3 months ago
[–] ArrogantAnalyst@infosec.pub 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 2 points 3 months ago

He's a natural 20!

[–] JetpackJackson 4 points 3 months ago (2 children)

He looks like he has a huge paw on his chin in that first picture lol! Insane how huge he looks

[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Ah, I see it!

The stripes make it look like a tiger leg. It does look (and is) very muscular. A bird's chest muscles make up 15-25% of total body weight.

[–] JetpackJackson 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Oh wow that's a lot! But I guess it makes sense since flying muscles probably are around there (please correct me if I'm wrong lol)

[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I will put it into context most of us will understand.

This is a chicken. Those 2 giant muscles in the middle, what we'd call the chicken breasts, are the pectorals. For us, we use them to push, as in a bench press or butterfly. For the birds, these are the flight muscles.

If you've carved a chicken or eaten chicken on the bone, you know the breast is by far the biggest piece. Part of that is selective breeding, so much so that the chickens we raise as food are too meaty to get very far with their wings anymore. Wild chickens (jungle fowl) can fly pretty decently for big birds.

Here's a jungle fowl:

You've also seen that the chicken breast is connected to that big ridge on the ribscage, that giant, long, sturdy breast bone.

That is a huge anchor point for the muscle to counteract all that force of the flapping. With our tiny pecs, we'd tear a muscle before we got anywhere close to getting off the ground. But the bird breastbone goes from the top of the ribs to the hips. If your chest muscles were the size of your whole torso and thicker than your thighs, imagine how strong you would be!

[–] JetpackJackson 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Oh wow... That's nuts! Thank you for the explanation!

[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 1 points 3 months ago

Absowlutely!

[–] Apeman42@lemmy.world 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Legit thought it was an owlbear for a second.

[–] JetpackJackson 2 points 3 months ago
[–] You 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Confirmed, he IS good at this. He looks like he's promising violence in each pic. But especially the top one. Can't decide if he took pointers from sumo or football.

[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

In most of the pics it looks like he has crazy eyes as well, that I feel make him look even more like he shouldn't be messed with.

Must be the camera angle, since they can't move their eyeballs, but it adds a fun little element to the scene.

[–] You 2 points 3 months ago

Ha! That's a Kubrick Stare, alright!

[–] pseudo@jlai.lu 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

On croirait une autruche !

[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Quel est l’oiseau qui adore se nourrir de miel?

L’autruche car à côté d’une ruche, il y a souvent une aut’ruche!

[–] pseudo@jlai.lu 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

What a nice pun! When did you master french?

[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 4 points 3 months ago

When one masters Google, they master all languages!

[–] jet@hackertalks.com 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] anon6789@lemmy.world 2 points 3 months ago

The pufferfish technique seems very effective across the animal world.