A Year Without Owls

March 15, 2026

A year without owls, that is how I will remember 2025.  The last time I saw a screech owl in our box was December 30, 2024, and now it is almost spring 2026. The entrance to the nest box is chewed around the circumference, evidence of the squirrel who invaded in early January and raised her litter there.  Inside, leaves, sawdust, all manner of debris that was collected to make the box a nest home relays a confusing and at the same time hopeful message.  Did that piece of fluff move?  Was someone in the box, looking for a place to raise a clutch?

Through the following year, we not only didn’t see owls, we never even heard them until about a week ago. It was about 2 a.m., and Daisy woke us up in the middle of the night.  As we stood outside on that early March morning, it came to us, the soft churring of the screech owl’s trill.  It must have been close for us to hear it, maybe right above us in the branches of the live oak.  Such a welcome sound we have not heard for so long gave us hope, hope that this screech owl might be calling to its mate; hope that a pair would still nest this year.

Though we check the box each day, it remains empty and, surprisingly, no squirrels either, which is cause for more speculation about how our climate, our world is changing.  This past autumn was warm and dry, and still rainfall is very low.  We are witnessing the impact changing climate has not only on us, but all the living creatures around us.

As winter nears its close signs of spring are everywhere.  We had almost no winter aside from a January ice storm.  Wildflower seeds I planted in October sprouted into blooming flowers in December.  I wondered if the ice storm would kill them, but instead, the plants held up, green foliage stretching to the sun, and yesterday a red poppy opened its petals, brightening our world and revealing the promise of a beautiful spring.

– Christine Baleshta