Whitehall Garden Club News - September

WHOOO Gives A HOOOOT?

September's Whitehall Garden Club meeting was very well attended, including several guests/visitors. A bountiful brunch table was set with a beautiful array of fresh fruits, delectable baked mini muffins and breads all served up by Marilyn Craft and Dorie Westhoven. Deeee-licious!

After President John Carlson adjourned the business meeting, Judy Chadwick introduced guest speaker WGC member, Cathy Hatch.

Cathy has lived in Whitehall for 45 years. She taught Elementary school in Butte, MT and also worked with MT Fish and Game as a "Project Wildlife" facilitator, providing workshops for educators encouraging the teaching of wildlife and ecology in the classrooms.

Cathy's presentation was about the lives of "Owls," their habitats, food sources, physical make-up along with all the "things we thought we knew about owls." First of "owl," did you know that the owl's large eyes have great binocular vision but their eyes, in fact do not move, hence they can move their necks/heads a whopping 270 degrees ensuring the owl doesn't miss its prey. Their ears are positioned on either side of their head, but one ear is higher and the other ear is positioned lower to once again not miss the sound of prey. When swooping in for prey their fringed feathers prevent any noise alerting the mouse or other small prey of their impending doom when their sharp widely spread talons clutch their catch. The owl does eat their prey whole, the gizzard digests the edible parts and about every 12 hours, the owl regurgitates those pieces not edible in what is called "owl pellets."

That's where Cathy's presentation became very exciting BECAUSE Cathy had owl pellets for all of us to dissect. We found bones, skulls, teeth, feathers, and plenty of UFOs (Unidentified Food Objects) as we picked and tweezed our way through the pellets. As you can see with the pictures, "scientists" of all ages were fascinated discovering what their owl had successfully hunted. One last note, when the female owl is nesting, the male owl brings mice to the nest. If he brings 1 mouse, the female will lay 1 egg, 2 mice, she'll lay 2 eggs, if the male owl doesn't bring any mice (suggesting a scarcity of that tasty nugget), she won't lay any eggs for that season. And the interesting facts go on and on! Thank you Cathy Hatch for such an amazing presentation continuing our fascination with owls.