A trio of barred owls hangs out in our neighborhood, and they really like my backyard. At night, they lull me to sleep with a cacaphony of weird hoots and the strangled yelps of their prey.

The owls are relatively tame. All three descended on my yard one afternoon while I was watering the plants. One swooshed down about 48 inches from me, blotting out the sun on his way towards a barely perceptible vole at the base of a tree. The shadows of the other two circled over the grass as they watched. The first one flew to a branch and started eating his catch. The other two touched down on a branch about ten feet away from me and watched their brother dine. I went inside, got the camera, came back out, and snapped a few pictures that went unnoticed. Then, to cover my bases, I switched on the flash and took another picture. As one, the two owls swiveled their heads from opposite directions to fix me with a curious stare. I snapped the picture below, the only one that turned out well.

After that, the owls and I chatted about the weather and the generally poor condition of the roofs in our neighborhood. They told me to clean out my gutters. I invited them to return the next day for tea and voles, but they stood me up. Anyway, nature is cool and stuff.