Baby Owl

by Aubrey Lang

Baby Owl  is a lovely little book about how great horned owls grow up. I really picked it up for the beautiful photographs (acquired when the author's husband, a wildlife photographer, built a platform 25 feet up in a nearby tree to observe the owl nest for nearly three months!) but was quite pleased with the text as well. It's easy to read and although written for a younger audience, very informative. Together the words and pictures describe how the young owls grow and develop, from the moment the eggs are laid until they are old enough to fly off on their own. It's really neat to see how the owlets change, from fuzzy little blobs, to getting the first patterned feathers, then finally becoming sleek adults. All the stages of their first year are well-illustrated; at first they just sit around the nest eating and sleeping, when a little bigger they stretch their legs and flap their wings, eventually the biggest one hops out of the nest to glide down to the forest floor where he perches on a short tree and the parents continue to feed and protect him. The owls are really striking animals and it's amazing to see how well-hidden they are with their stippled plumage blending into the surrounding tree bark. I'm so taken by this little book that I now want to look for others in the series and share them with my kid.

Rating: 4/5 ........ 36 pages, 2004