Penn Vet’s Wildlife Futures seek to unravel the mystery of the disappearing barn owl
A multiyear study looks at the causes of declining populations, which will help inform conservation efforts in the future.
2 min. read
If someone has a vermin problem, they couldn’t ask for a better ally than a barn owl. One barn owl family can catch and eat about 3,000 rodents a year. “The farmer’s best friend,” one Pennsylvania biologist called them.
But these special animals are in trouble. Barn owls are a Pennsylvania Species of Greatest Conservation Need, having experienced an over 50% decline in their statewide distribution, according to the last state survey, with no sign of rebound.
Penn Vet student Jennifer Grell is gaining wildlife field work experience with Penn Vet’s Wildlife Futures Program.
(Image: Courtesy of Penn Vet News)
Penn Vet’s Wildlife Futures Program and the Pennsylvania Game Commission (PGC) have been engaged in a collaborative effort to identify the causes of these owls’ decline and any actions that might help them.
Loss of the open grassland habitats where these owls traditionally have found their prey has been recognized as a chief threat to their species’ continued survival. Wildlife Futures and PGC have been exploring other potential risks.
“Wildlife Futures recently completed a multiyear study to investigate the effects of pesticides on the Pennsylvania barn owl population,” says Lisa Murphy, director of Wildlife Futures and resident director of the Pennsylvania Animal Diagnostic Laboratory System (PADLS).
The researchers’ theory was since rodents are the owls’ main food source, rodenticides consumed by their prey might be killing the owls. That, however, didn’t deliver sufficient evidence.
As part of the study, dead barn owls, including ones found by the PGC, underwent necropsies by Wildlife Futures. Those will continue as more birds are found, says Erica Miller, wildlife veterinarian and Wildlife Futures field operations manager. PADLS performed all the testing of the samples taken for the study from both living and deceased birds.
Barn owls will also be counted in Wildlife Futures’ ongoing research into the effects of West Nile Virus on Pennsylvania’s breeding bird populations.
“We are trying to learn from every owl that we obtain that doesn’t make it,” Miller says. “We want to know why, and to see if we can learn anything that can help us better understand what is happening to them as a population.”
This story is by Rita Giordano. Read more at Penn Vet News.
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