What’s up smart people. Joe here. It's time for the big game. You know the one…the game,
with the guys, on the field, in the pads, with the ball…you know…
PBS Sports Presents…
The Superb Owl! (*totally 100% not infringing on copyright* graphic)
There’s been one team in the bird league this year that’s been dominating
the rest, we’re talkin’ skill, agility, speed, the ability to fly, and enormous talons at every position,
ready to get OWL up in your grill… let’s meet the team!
On the ground or in the air, these guys are deadly… ok maybe not with
an actual football, maybe more like a mouse…
Owls need sensory super powers because they’ve gotta be efficient hunting machines. A barn
owl could easily have 7 owl babies, each needin’ to eat 5 mice a day. Got the big eaters in
there! And since they only hunt at night, that’s 6 hours to gain 35 mice.
To make the most of every play, you’ve gotta be able to see the field. Luckily, relative
to body size owls have gigantic eyes, maximum visual sensitivity in low-light. Owl peepers
are so big, regular sphere-shaped eyeballs like ours wouldn’t leave any room for bird brains
Solution? Tubular eyes. They get a larger eye opening and it keeps their
skull small. That's a win-win baby.
But the drawback of tubular eyes means you can’t move 'em in your sockets, but luckily owls
can go full Exorcist, they can rotate their heads around up to 270 degrees.
Now great vision is one skill, but these guys are the total package! When it’s too dark
to see, they pull a special page from their playbook. Their owl ears.
Except those aren’t actually ears. Their whole face is an ear.
Owl faces may look flat, but that’s just a feathery fakeout. This is ruff. A facial
ruff!
Let’s take apart this key to the game™. The ruff has two different types of feathers.
You got your guys in the middle here to protect the face and eyes, and these guys out here
on the edge? they can move either way. They reflect sound towards a couple asymmetrically
placed receivers, these guys hit the perfect angle to create super-hearing.
Talk about a hoot! Their face is basically a sound collecting radar dish. Their hearing’s
so good, they can even hunt mice underneath snow. Focus on the sound, swoop in, and it’s
game over.
Rounding out this total skill package, owls have even evolved silent flight.
Just look at that wingspan! When you’ve got big flappers compared to your body size,
you can fly slowly and create less noise. The front edge of that wing is serrated to
dampen sound, it’s like velvet, baby! While that front edge is laying out lead blocking
on the passing air, the trailing edge has this fringed texture, that means less drag,
all speed. You hear that? Me neither!
You don’t have to be Owlbert Einstein to see these guys are basically perfect stealth
flying machines! We’ve got engineers studying them to figure out how to make quieter planes
and drones. Which.. is.. terrifying.
When they hit paydirt they swallow their food pretty much whole. Then what goes down comes
back up a few hours later, basically a well-preserved pack of undigested bones and fur. That’s
disgusting, but useful, it can give you a play by play of what species the owl ate.
When scientists find old, preserved owl pellets, they can study how small mammal communities
have changed over thousands of years, it’s a whole history recorded in owl food!
Owls may not have the passing ability of a guy like Tom Brady, but when you can see and
hear the field like that… Superb Owls? They’re champs!
Stay curious! And don't miss our halftime show: Deadmouse!