wooden box up in the barn rafters. It’sbreakfast time and the hungry youngbarn owls are jockeying for position astheir father brings in the first vole ofthe evening. By dawn, it is a chore heand his mate will havecompleted a dozen ormore times to feed theirfive growing young.

Barn owls (Tytoalba), with their whitishplumage and distinctiveheart-shaped facial ruffs,have a striking appearance.They are one of nature’s most effectivepredators: They have excellent low-

A new recovery plan and conservation programraise hopes for the barn owl in Illinois.

A Brighter Future fora Bird of the Night

Story By Jeff Walk, AnneMankowski, Terry Esker,Mark Alessi, Maggie Cole

I t’s dusk over the open mead-ow, and a pale, ghostlikeapparition is floating over thegrass, silent on buoyant wings.In an instant, the figure J-

hooks, folds its broad wings andplunges to the ground. Somewhere onthe prairie, a meadow vole must havebeen very unlucky, because within aminute, eerie hissing and twitteringsounds start rising in intensity from the

light vision, their flight is silent tohuman ears, and their acute hearingallows them to capture prey in totaldarkness. And barn owls consume a lotof voles and other mid-sized prey,including rats and mice, to fuel theirfull-throttle lifestyle.

Unlike most other owls, which areslow to mature, tend to be long-lived,

June 2011 OutdoorIllinois / 15

The goal of the Illinois barn

owl recovery plan is to upgrade

this bird from endangered to

threatened—to recovered.

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and only raise a few young each year,barn owls can begin breeding whenthey are as young as 8 months, oftenraise four to seven young in one brood,and sometimes nest two or more timesin a year when prey are plentiful. Whilelate spring-early summer is the peak ofnesting activity, incubation and brood-rearing can occur during any month ofthe year in Illinois. One pair in MarionCounty hatched five clutches andfledged 15 young in a marathon of non-stop nesting lasting 23 months. The flipside of living fast is dying young, andmost barn owls don’t survive until theirsecond birthday in the wild. Fewer than20 percent of adult barn owls will sur-vive more than a single nesting season.

Besides a good supply of rodentsand secure nesting sites, barn owlsdon’t need a lot to thrive. Barn owls arenot well-suited to cold temperatures,and they are less effective hunting inheavily wooded areas, so they arefound in a variety of open habitats intropical and temperate zones aroundthe world. The Illinois-Wisconsin stateline is roughly as far north as barn owlscan survive through the winter.

Barn owls are highly adaptable topotential nest sites. True to their name,barns, grain bins, silos, belfries, nestboxes and a variety of other humanstructures all may be used for nesting,in addition to natural nest sites, such astree cavities and dens on cliffs andbluffs. Because young owls often dis-perse hundreds of miles in search oftheir own mates and nesting areas afterleaving the nest, barn owls can readilycolonize areas far from other knownbarn owl populations. Given their widedistribution and tolerance of humanactivity, and tendency to nest in barnsand other structures, barn owls are like-ly the most familiar owl in the world.

In spite of this versatility, barn owlsare rare in the Midwest and endangeredin Illinois. Population declines since the1920s are best correlated with chang-ing agricultural practices, particularlythe shift from small-field diversifiedfarming practices, including perennial

grasslands for haying and grazing, tolarge-field annual row cropping, whichreduced the abundance of small mam-mals across large portions of the land-scape. Voles—short-tailed, stocky ballsof brown fur about the size of a chick-en egg—are the preferred prey of barnowls in the Midwest, and are muchmore abundant in hay, pasture, prairieremnants, roadsides and other perenni-al grasslands than in cropland.

From 1950 to 2007, the area devotedto hay and pasture in Illinois decreasedby more than 5 million acres, whereascorn and soybean acreage increased by9 million acres. These land-use changescorrelate with the declining popula-tions of many types of farmlandwildlife, including pheasants, quail, rab-bits and many grassland-nesting birds.The same types of land-use changes—

What should I do if I find a barn owl nest or injured barn owl? It happensevery year: A thunderstorm knocks down a hollow part of a silver maple in some-

one’s yard, or an idled grain bin is being cleaned out, and suddenly young barn owls areon the ground, scrambling for safety. Some are fully feathered, others are smaller andmuch less developed. What to do? Resist the temptation to intervene, and only movebirds if they are in immediate danger, moving them only as far as is absolutely necessary.

Contact a DNR biologist to help resolve the situation (www.dnr.state.il.us/conservation/naturalheritage/sstaff.htm); in addition to being endangered in Illinois, barn owlsare federally protected like other birds, and having them in possession without permitsis illegal. Only injured birds should be taken to a wildlife rehabilitator, as released birdshave lower survival than wild birds. Remaining in the care of their parents in the wild isa young barn owl’s best chance for surviving. Young barn owls in a nest vary in age byup to 2 weeks, so smaller, less developed birds are normal, and not a sign of disease ormalnourishment. Young barn owls can be placed into a nearby secure nest box, andtheir parents will find them and resume caring and feeding for them. The adults may alsotry re-nesting in the nest box.

16 / OutdoorIllinois June 2011

Barn owls feed at night on voles

and similar-sized prey.

In addition to natural cavities,

barn owls nest in barns, grain bins

and other human-structures.

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and downward barn owl populationtrends—have been reported fromEurope. Barn owl conservation hasbeen widely attempted, with mixedsuccess. Nest boxes installed for barnowls are readily adopted, and in someareas have led to population increaseswhere adequate prey are available.Releases of captive-reared barn owls,on the other hand, have not producedclear benefits to wild populations inspite of being repeatedly attempted.

Although barn owls are rare in Illi-nois, they remain broadly distributed.Over the past 20 years (1990-2009),barn owl nesting has been reportedfrom 31 counties, mostly in the south-ern half of the state (see Figure 1).Barn owl populations are secure in Mis-sissippi River Valley states south of Illi-nois, and populations in some Mid-western states, including Missouri andOhio, appear to be expanding. In Illi-nois, the establishment of about800,000 acres of new grasslandsthrough the Conservation Reserve Pro-gram beginning in the late 1980s prob-ably created improved foraging habitatfor barn owls, and may be contributingto the apparent increase in barn owlreports since 1990. Counties in south-ern and south-central Illinois, wheremany of the recent barn owl nestrecords are located, have large areas

enrolled in the Conservation ReserveProgram (see Figure 2).

Over the past few decades, Depart-ment of Natural Resources biologistsand others have occasionally put upbarn owl nest boxes, most of whichhave not been regularly monitored.Many of the barn owl nests that arereported are found under haphazard,often unfortunate, situations, such as a

tree with a nest cavity being knockeddown by a storm, or a nest in an oldstructure revealed during demolition.With the support of a State WildlifeGrant (T-35-P-1) from the U.S. Fish &Wildlife Service, DNR and the IllinoisEndangered Species Protection Boardformed a team in 2009 to develop andimplement a recovery program so thatbarn owls no longer need to be listed asthreatened or endangered in Illinois.

In 2010, the team solicited reports ofbarn owls, searched databases and otherreports, revisited sites with past barnowl nesting activity, and checked sever-al nest boxes that had been in place foryears. The results were pleasantly sur-prising: at least 19 barn owl nests in 16counties (see Figure 1)—nearly as manynests as reported through all of the pastdecade. Many of the nest boxes whichhad been put into place years earlierwere still in good condition. Other dam-aged nest boxes were replaced, and 45new nest boxes installed.

The Illinois barn owl recovery plan,approved by DNR and the EndangeredSpecies Protection Board in November

June 2011 OutdoorIllinois / 17

Barn owl populations have

increased in some areas where

nest boxes have been installed.

Figure 1: Reported barn owl nesting Figure 2: CRP acreages relative toreported barn owl nesting

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2010 (available on the “Publications”link at www.dnr.state.il.us/espb/index/htm), set a goal of 40 active nest sites,distributed among at least 15 countieswithin in a 5-year period, to consider anupgrade in status from endangered tothreatened. Doubling those marks (80nests in 30 counties) would mean barnowls probably are recovered in the state.With the encouraging results from the2010 field season, we are well on ourway toward those objectives, but reach-ing them will take a sustained effort.

The easiest, most effective and cost-efficient action people can take to helpbarn owls is deploying and monitoringnest boxes within suitable nesting areas.Barn owls readily adopt nest boxes ofvarious designs, and barn owl nests inboxes tend to be more productive thannests in natural cavities. Because nestboxes can be easily monitored—andbarn owl nests in other situations aredifficult to locate—monitoring nestboxes is the only practical way forassessing the status and trend of localbarn owl populations. While barn owlscan show up almost anywhere in Illi-nois, nest boxes that are close to grass-land hunting areas and farther south inIllinois are more likely to be used.

Barn owls have nested at some grass-land conservation areas, includingPrairie Ridge State Natural Area (Jasperand Marion counties) and Pyramid StatePark (Perry County). Expanding grass-land sites and creating additional sitesdedicated to conserving grasslandwildlife are likely to benefit barn owlsand other rare and declining species.

Grassland wildlife are among themost imperiled in the state, making theneed for dedicated grassland conserva-tion areas particularly acute. Otherways of encouraging land-use practicesthat support populations of voles andother small mammals will ultimatelybenefit barn owls as well. Perennialgrassy habitats, such as hay fields, pas-tures, wet meadows and ConservationReserve Program grasslands, all supportgreater populations of small mammals,especially voles, than do row crops.Several grassland focus areas eligible forthe State Acres for Wildlife Enhance-ment Program, an extension of the Con-servation Reserve Program, are currentopportunities to establish grassland for-aging habitat for barn owls in land-scapes well-suited to other grasslandwildlife. There are recent barn owl nestrecords in or near all the SAFE-eligibleareas in the Southern Till Plain naturaldivision in south-central Illinois.

As shown by the results of the 2010surveys, barn owls probably occurmore often in Illinois than recordsindicate, so the public is encouragedto report barn owls to help monitor

their true distribution in Illinois. Thecooperation of private landownerswill be essential for putting up andmonitoring more nest boxes, andimproving grassland habitat. Nest-boxmonitoring and reporting could beconducted by volunteer groups, suchas 4-H clubs, scout troops, FutureFarmers of America chapters andAudubon Society chapters.

Clearly, getting the word out aboutbarn owls, and what you can do tohelp, enhances the chances of a fullrecovery.

The authors serve on the barn owlrecovery team. Jeff Walk is the director ofscience for The Nature Conservancy inIllinois, Anne Mankowski is the director ofthe Illinois Endangered Species ProtectionBoard, Terry Esker is the DNR districtnatural heritage biologist based in Newton,Mark Alessi is a human dimensionsspecialist with the Illinois Natural HistorySurvey and Maggie Cole is the DNR Region2 natural heritage administrator.

How and where should I put up a nest box? Barn owls are not too picky aboutthe style of their nest box. We’ve seen them nesting in garbage cans and children’s

play houses. Nest trays suspended from the rafters of a barn or interior of a bin or silocan be effective. In open spaces without a nearby tree or structure for a nest box or tray,boxes mounted on a free-standing pole are another option.

Anything with about 2-3 square feet of interior space is adequate. Consider the safetyof the young before and after leaving the nest when placing a nest box. As examples, anest box opening directly to a barn’s exterior and surrounded by aluminum flashing willhelp keep raccoons out of the box, and a predator guard on a pole-mounted nest box isa good idea. Although barn owls can be surprisingly tolerant of activity, placing nestboxes away from heavy traffic areas, augers and other machinery, and stored chemicalswill reduce risks to young birds as they start venturing from the nest.

Adult barn owls do most of their hunting within a mile of their nest site. If a third ormore of that area is prey-rich hunting areas, such as hayfields, pastures, CRP grasslands,marshes, orchards and vineyards, conditions probably are excellent for barn owls.

There’s not much you can do about where your property is in the state, but it’s a simplereality that farther northward, cold temperatures and snow cover limit barn owl survival.Although barn owls recently have nested as far north as Carroll, Whiteside and Will coun-ties, nest boxes in the southern half of the state have better odds of hosting barn owls.

You can help with the recovery of

the barn owl by reporting sightings.

B arn owl sightings should bereported to your district heritage

biologist (county list available atwww.dnr.state.il.us/conservation/naturalheritage/sstaff.htm).

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