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Wild Bird Longevity

Bryant Olsen
/
Flickr.com https://tinyurl.com/klyh8za

While cleaning out wood duck boxes in anticipation of the upcoming nesting season, a biologist of Upper Ouachita National Wildlife Refuge recently found a roosting screech owl in one of the boxes. Small owls are often found in the boxes and are occasionally banded during the encounter.

When this owl was captured, the biologist noticed that it was already banded. He duly noted the band number and released the bird. Upon checking records back at the office, he was surprised to find that the owl had been banded as an adult eight years earlier. This means the bird is now at least ten years old and brings up the question, "How long do birds live in the wild?"

Kelby was a biologist and manager of National Wildlife Refuges for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for more than 30 years. He has worked with alligators in gulf coast marshes and Canada geese on Hudson Bay tundra. His most recent project was working with his brother Keith of the Louisiana Nature Conservancy on the largest floodplain restoration project in the Mississippi River Basin at the Mollicy Unit of the Upper Ouachita National Wildlife Refuge, reconnecting twenty-five square miles of former floodplain forest back to the Ouachita River.
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