Owl Pellets

In our study of birds we are on to learning about raptors and this past week it was owls. Everyone in the house is already owl fans because owls are cool and because of having read about the barn owl, Wesley. If you are learning about owls, you have to dissect owl pellets, right? We were supposed to do this as our Friday activity, but put it off until today so that D. could be a part of it. (He was tech all week last week.) Today was an honorary Friday and we'll make Friday a regular school day. We listened to another selection of classical music based on birds and then dissected owl pellets.

L., who was thrilled we were doing 'real' science, and evidently dressed up for the occasion.

There was a lot of fur to be found.

Look at R. doing this all by herself. She was particularly excited to work on the owl pellets because she adores owls. It took a little explaining that these were not owl bones, but mice bones we were digging out. I'm not sure she was convinced.

The scientists hard at work.

Several skulls

It's hard to see, but this is R. triumphantly holding up a bone she dug out herself. I didn't really help her and she did a great job and was one of the longest working.

D. laid his bones out neatly so they could be seen.

TM found three skulls.

Everyone enjoyed it and worked hard at it. It felt a little wrong to then just toss the bones into the garbage, but that is what I did. They were all so small that it would have been impossible to keep them for looking at, and they were not clean at all and I didn't relish that process, either.

One funny thing. When I ordered them, it seems that owl pellets are one of the things that can be made into a standing order on Amazon. Really? How many owl pellets does one person need? Even science teachers can't be dissecting owl pellets that often, can they?

Oh, and Kenzie seems to be just fine, thankfully. No bonus trips to the vet needed.