Barred Owl Pellet Found in My Arkansas Yard

I was walking through my yard when I noticed several black feathers under one of my pine trees. It looked like something had caught one of the many Common Grackles that have been hanging around here for the last several weeks. While looking at the feathers, I also found what appears to be a Barred Owl pellet.

Wildlife Notes on a Possible Barred Owl Pellet

I hear Barred Owls at night in my yard, but I have never seen one here in daylight. That is why this find stood out to me. I cannot say for certain that this pellet came from a Barred Owl, but it seems possible based on its size, the packed hair, and the tiny bone fragments mixed in.

Owls often swallow prey in chunks and later cough up the parts they cannot digest. Those pellets can contain hair, bones, teeth, and feathers. From the outside, this one appeared to be made up mostly of hair, with a few small bits of bone visible.

The black feathers under the pine tree may or may not be connected to the pellet. They could be from the same event, but I cannot prove that from what I saw. Finding both in the same spot made me wonder if an owl had hunted there during the night.

Over the years, I have photographed birds regurgitating pellets. One of those photos was even published in a book, which I wrote about in this post, A Feathered Honor: My Photo in Ed Drewitt’s Book. That is one reason this find caught my eye right away.

A Closer Look Inside the Pellet

Placing a tape measure next to the pellet helped show its size much more clearly. That gives a much better sense of its size than the photo alone. It is a solid, compact mass and looks larger than what many people might expect when they think about an owl pellet.

I always find signs like this interesting because they reveal what happens in the yard when I am not out there watching. I hear the owls after dark, but this was a reminder that they leave clues behind.

After taking the original photo, I decided to break the pellet apart to see what was inside. It came apart easily and had a texture very similar to dryer lint. Most of it was tightly packed hair, with small bones scattered throughout. Seeing it this way made it clear how much of the prey an owl cannot digest and later casts out.

Photography Notes

I took this photo with my phone as a simple record shot to document what I found. My goal was to clearly show the shape of the pellet, the texture of the hair, the tiny bone fragments, and the tape measure for scale.

The weathered wood background helps the pellet stand out, and the straight-on angle keeps the image clear and easy to study. This was more about documenting the find than making a polished wildlife portrait, and in this case that worked well.

Closing

I cannot confirm that this is definitely a Barred Owl pellet, but it does look like a strong possibility to me. Either way, it was a neat wildlife find in my yard and another reminder that a lot happens out there overnight.