Circleville Owl Pellet Dissection

On November 12th I visited the 3rd grade classes at Circleville Elementary School in the Pine Bush CSD and did an owl ecology program. After discussion on how ornithologists might do a survey of the common owls of the Circleville area we dissected owl pellets. Here are the results.

Feuerstack’s class 14 pellets – 26 mice, 7 shrews, 0 moles, 0 birds
Eller’s class 12 pellets – 25 mice, 2 shrews, 0 moles, 4 birds
DelMoro’s class 11 pellets – 23 mice, 4 shrews, 1 mole, 1 bird
Lindsay’s class 11 pellets – 25 mice, 1 shrew, 0 moles, 1 bird

A total of 48 pellets were dissected. Most of the pellets were the large size pellets available from Pellets, Inc. (see link below on the right). There were 4 small pellets used in Mrs. Feuerstack’s class. These small size pellets might affect the average number of prey found per pellet.

A total of 99 mice, 14 shrews, 1 mole and 6 birds were found in the pellets. That averages two and a half prey animals per pellet. If an owl produces four pellets per night how many prey animals might be eaten? How many of these would most likely be mice?

It’s interesting to note the number of birds eaten. This seems to be an unusually high number as compared to other dissection classes (look through the blog archives to see other dissection results). Perhaps the owls that produced these pellets have a particular fondness for birds. There could be several reasons for this. One might be that there was an abundance of small birds in the area that the owls hunted making it easier or more likely that they would capture birds for food. Another could be that these owls may have had a preference for birds and hunted them more successfully than the typical owl. Just like people, sometimes an animal develops a taste for certain prey. If that is the case that predator might pursue their favorite prey more so than other predators of their kind. An example of this is a kestrel I once observed. This kestrel had a fondness for snakes. It would often be seen flying to its nest box with a snake in its talons to feed its young. “Feathers in the Wind” by James J. Brett, published by the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary Association (see link below), lists insect and mice as the most favored food for Kestrels, followed by small birds and amphibians. Snakes as a food source are not even mentioned.