wisdom from owls

Great Gray Owl in full camo.

This post was taken from a comment from one of my readers (Brizdaz). He is reading a book, The Healing Wisdom of Birds by Lesley Morrison. This is a book about all kinds of birds, but the author confesses that owls are her favorite.

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(from the forward)

When I undertook this project, many people asked me why I felt compelled to write a whole book about birds. My answer? I was haunted day and night, until I did. The universe has a funny way of making its advice known, and after challenging encounters and rescues with feathered creatures I finally got the message. I became alerted to the silent mission before me, and was compelled by an unyielding insistence to pay closer attention to birds and their world. So I remained haunted until the final manuscript was complete.

(an excerpt about owls)

The owl will always be the dearest bird species to me, and I have had many sad and spiritual encounters with this magnificent bird of prey. The owl has traditionally been very close to the spirit worlds, and associations between the owl, death, and magic are quite prominent and widespread.

If owl chooses you as a student, you are to become aware of all that moves in the dark. These could be hidden motives, thoughts, or emotions within you or others that have been kept from the light of awareness. Or there may be a hidden gift of clairvoyance and magic that needs nurturing when owl appears. Owl is the guardian spirit of many magicians and shamans, and often portends a time of deep learning or training in the ways of magical sight and manifestation.

Owl people can pierce the normal boundaries of space and time, and are quite adept at traveling back and forth between worlds. Having the owl as a totem is not always an easy experience. In fact, I consider owl's medicine to be among the most challenging. Owl people are usually solitary and must sometimes take hits from those without a firm spiritual understanding.

Owl spirit guides will often visit their human companions in the dream-time. This is where the owl imparts wisdom through dream symbolism and imagery. The owl person must learn about archetypes -  universal symbolic images - in order to decipher owl's hidden messages. Symbolism is the crux of magic, and must be studied carefully by the owl person.

Owl people are often troubled by an innate wisdom of the universe that finds no expression or validation in the affairs of humans. They disdain many social structures,  and find it difficult to maintain close relationships with people in general. Many people aligned with owl find that retreat from the disenchanted world is the greatest path to understanding, and owl will often guide those with it's medicine away from their normal preoccupation with everyday activities by instilling a sense of disappointment in the owl soul person.

This sense of discontent eventually leads the owl person into deep exploration of the hidden worlds. The spirit of owl seems to haunt their very souls, as if a constant reminder of the illusory nature of life on earth.

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Please note: I edited this excerpt slightly.

an owl listens to my podcast!

me and my little buddy

This story comes from a reader who sent me an email me with an interesting story. Curiously, this story includes me. It starts with a photograph taken a few summers back, and it shows me sitting near a great horned owl.

I was at an event where a local raptor rescue center was taking part in this community fundraiser. There was a golden eagle, a falcon and a great horned owl. This owl had been rescued after someone found it with a severely injured left wing. It was nursed back to health but it was unable to fly so in couldn’t be released back into the wild. Now its life involves living at the center and occasionally being shown at elementary schools an other public events like the one on that day.

I couldn’t miss out on the chance to get a picture with a live owl! In the photograph you can clearly see that the owl’s left wing hangs awkwardly at its side. I posted this photo on my blog and facebook page the same day it was taken, August 4th, 2012 (see HERE). The photo was taken in a big barn, and this shows up again a little over a year later, where I watch a "fact checking" owl land on that same barn, HERE.

Four days later I got a an email from a woman named Diana. That morning she was in her house trying to transfer one of my audio interviews onto her iPod, but the download was going really slowly. While she was waiting she went outside to take the trash to the curb and saw what she thought was a bundle of something in the driveway, when she got closer she realized it was an injured owl. The poor creature could barely move because of an open wound under it’s right wing. The owl would flop onto its back and as it struggled to get upright, she saw the wing twisting, there was almost nothing holding it in place. 

Diana sent me a photo of the sad looking wounded owl in a dog kennel. Curiously one of the only words I can read on the paper is "Angel" 

She got a dog carrier from her garage and after some struggles got the bird into the container using a rake. She went back into the house to search out a local veterinarian’s office that was affiliated with wildlife rescue. After that she transferred the podcast to her MP3 player. She put the dog carrier with the injured owl in the car with her and drove to the vet. Here’s the weird part, on the drive both her and the owl were listening to my voice. 

The similarities between her story and my photo are positively bizarre. Both stories feature a wildlife rescue, a great horned owl with an injured wing and both owls got to listen to my voice. She was also clear that she had not seen the photograph of me and the injured owl before contacting me with her experience. She told me what episode she was listening to and it involved me and the guest, Lorin Cutts, talking about owls and how they interact with UFO abductees! Lorin has had some extremely strange owl experiences of his own.

I can’t ignore the fact that the woman who shared this story is named Diana. In Roman mythology, the goddess Diana was associated with wild animals and woodland, and having the power to talk to animals.

two pictures with the same owl

There is even more synchro-wierdness connected to this image. The author of the Longmire series of books, Craig Johnson, and oddly enough—he is pictured with the very same owl! Also note our choice of shirts.

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A little more about the day I had my picture taken with the owl

It was a lovely summer afternoon at the festive small town event, and I took the time to speak with a doctor who was working with the veterinarians and naturalists at the center. I briefly told him about some of my experiences with owls. I described seeing three owls on two separate occasions within a few days and then asked if he had ever heard of anything like that. He said no. Then I told him another story of seeing five owls fly above me and a friend as we were lying on our back in a meadow talking about metaphysical issues. I asked if he had ever heard anything like that. Again, he said no. He added that such things simply don’t happen. Then I told him another of my experiences, and another. He looked at me with concern. As I talked I recognized he was getting uncomfortable and he slowly began moving away from me. It was a curious feeling to realize that an owl expert hearing my experiences was looking at me as if I was insane.

and a little more... 

The date of August 9th plays into another owl sighting I had, and their connected synchronicites. This involves seeing an owl in my yard, and it coincides with a friend's mystical experience in crop circle country, linked HERE.

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Archetypes and screen memories

Chapter in progress: This is an excerpt from a book project with the working title; Owls, Sychronicity and the UFO Abductee. I plan on posting a few samples from time to time. 

—Mike C

Most of the research for this book has been me reaching out to folks with curious stories, and just asking the question, “Do you have any odd owl experiences?” Most of the time the reply would be no. I got a lot of replies that played out as screen memories, the smallest percentage were the extremely unusual experiences that involved, as far as I can tell, real owls. I would ask this of folks through email, phone calls and in face to face meetings. A lot of the time I would ask this question to complete strangers, or to people I barely knew.

Peter was one of the experiencers featured in Dr. John Mack’s 1994 book Abduction, and the events in his life have been extremely intense. I’ve talked on the phone with him only once, and we've shared a few emails over the years. He’s been supportive and insightful in all of my correspondence.

As part of this book project, I sent Peter one of these emails, asking him that same question, had he ever had any odd owl experiences. He replied:

That is what got me in the door, so to say, to begin looking at this in my life. When I lived in Hawaii, there was a big old owl (that’s what I thought at the time) that would come to the sliding glass door off my bedroom at night. Of course under regression when I looked at the owl it was a whole other creature. So yeah, me and owls and ET's have a connection.

This owl fits cleanly into the screen memory category, it seems to play out as deceptive owl imagery projected into Peter’s mind, presumably so he wouldn’t be terrified of seeing a creepy gray alien. How this is done is a mystery, why is another question. One easy way to frame this is that the owl is nothing more that a convenient disguise, it’s a common enough animal, and those big penetrating eyes seem to match the likeness of the iconic alien. This might be exactly the reason for the owl deception, but it just feels too simple.

I suspect that this contact experience has been ongoing throughout the entirety of human history, and the reverence for the owl in folklore and mythology can be traced back to experiences just like what Peter described. The shamans and sages throughout time might have confronted similar owls, staring at them from their own doorways.

 read more below 

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owl on Christmas morning (updated)

eerie cell phone image of an owl

I received an interesting comment from a fellow named Robert, it arrived on Christmas morning. It was on the post about the missing text in the owl book (below from Dec. 19). These are the kinds of accounts I have been receiving since the publication of the book. His is not the only one, but it is a good example—and he has a photo!

Below is a slightly edited excerpt of his original comment to me.

Mike, even before I found you and your blog, I had been aware of the connection with owls and UFOs—maybe it was from Strieber, I can't remember but I know it was years ago. Well I discovered your blog and was fascinated when you brought the idea back into my awareness. So, two days ago I was listening to The Paracast, and Gene and Chris and Gene announced your new book was out and they hoped to get you on. I thought, cool. So today, Christmas eve, I went to my nieces back patio to smoke a cigarette and listen to a new podcast. Well, it was Where Did The Road Go and they brought up your new book and one of the guests said something to the effect, ‘Oh wow, I'm probably going to start seeing owls everywhere.’ (paraphrasing here). Again I thought how weird to be hearing about Mike's new book, I must get it soon. 

Okay, so this morning, Christmas day at 5 a.m., I walked out on aforementioned patio to smoke and I shit you not—an owl landed five feet from me, stared at me for a few seconds, then gracefully, calmly hopped up onto the little decorative fence and continued to stare at me. I didn't scream or even gasp, I just heard myself say, "Hey Mr. Owl, do you have something to tell me?" Since I had my phone, I slowly walked to within a few feet of this magnificent animal. It let me take a picture! I swear this all happened over the course of like 30 hours. I mostly just feel like, how cool, a little bit of grace and awe from the universe! Synchronicity indeed. But what exactly do I take away from it? Not sure, but I suddenly feel the need to pay a little more attention to my life. Thanks, Robert.

close up of the same photo

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New text added December 27th 2015

Robert saw another owl! It happened early this morning.

Here is the message from Robert (excerpt edited slightly):

I stepped out to the back patio off the living room to smoke. The owl, once more, landed on her neighbors patio fence. Since my niece was sitting in the living room and I had only closed the screen door behind me, I said through the screen,"Hey, my owl is back come see.” 

She jumped, phone in hand, and joined me. I didn't change position and told her, I'm going to stand still but the owl may let you get pretty close, just be slow in your approach. I heard her say, "Hey bird, you're so pretty.”  I said please take a picture with your good phone and I'll pass it along to Mike. So she did and here it is [see below]. ... She's very tolerant of her crazy uncle and his "owl" thing, but tonight she was floored by the experience from a place of "I can't believe this magnificent wild creature let me get so close."

Robert’s first owl sighting was early in the morning on Christmas day in Louisiana. The day before, at about 1:45 a.m. a police officer was attacked by an owl that flew into the open window of his car patrol. It happened about 100 miles away in the suburban town of Covington Louisiana. See a TV report of this weird news story HERE. My first thought when I heard about the cop with the owl in the car was “Uh oh!”

Barred owl in a cop car in Louisiana (Dec. 24)

Here's a rundown of all this:

        ~ Cop gets attacked by an owl (Dec. 24)
        ~ Robert sees his first owl (Dec. 25)
        ~ Mike posts about Robert's owl sighting with picture (Dec. 26)
        ~ Robert sees that owl again with picture (Dec 27)

All this happened during a full (or nearly) moon on a holiday noted for an unusual star in the sky heralding a new era of love and forgiveness. And, my missing time event happened on a suburban street named Covington.

Robert ended his most recent email with this: "I've had about as much synchronicity as my tired brain can handle for a bit!"

Barred owl on the same fence in Louisiana (Dec. 27)

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great-horned owl on the little league backstop

Great-horned owl on the backstop

I took a picture of an owl on Friday, Oct 7th. 

About ten minutes before the sighting I spoke aloud and asked to see an owl. This is something I never do, but the twilight had an eerie power, and it felt like the perfect night to see an owl, so I asked. 

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Right below the owl was a deer, lying on the ground, and it was too dark to get her in a photo. The goddess Athena has a companion owl and the goddess Diana has a companion deer (usually portrayed as a fawn). So, two resonant goddesses at the little league baseball diamond—symbolically anyway.

Also, owl and deer are far and away the most common screen memories reported by UFO abductees.

The deer lying below the owl is an odd detail. I approached the deer in almost complete darkness. I was walking straight for it, and got pretty close. I made a hard right turn when I saw it, I was surprised she let me get so close. She was sitting with her legs tucked under her body, like cats sometimes sit. (I’ve always equated this to how duck look when they float on a pond).

I walked around the deer, and asked: “Where are your babies?" There has been a Doe with two fawns at that baseball field a lot lately, and I assumed it was the mother deer (I’m calling it “she" for this post). I looked around but didn’t see the fawns.

I went through one gate (I’d propped it open a few days ago), then walked across the diamond, then out another gate. I was on my way home when I head a loud squawk. At first I thought it was a fox, but soon realized it was a female great horned owl. They make a “mournful squawk” and I went back onto the diamond and found the owl. I took a few pics, and tried to get closer. As I approached the owl flew away to another fence. I got a picture on the second fence, but it was further away and less cinematic. I had a little headlamp and tried to shine it on the owl, but it didn't doo much. When I pointed into the darkness below the owl, where the deer was sitting, I saw two eyes reflecting back at me in the darkness. It was cute!

The owl was first seen on the smaller “little league” backstop fence, and it flew to the next fence, and this was on the standard size field. Symbolically, this movement from one fence to another implied graduating or growing up—moving from the little kid’s diamond to the adult diamond. And the kid's field is where I’ve been seeing the fawns. 

A few days ago I saw the mother deer in the little league field, and the two fawns were stuck outside, unable to get over the fence. I’ve seen the mother deer hop over the fence, and its very graceful. I opened a big gate (propping it open with a big rock, as I mentioned above) and after that I've seen the babies on the field with their mom. 

~ ~ ~

These baseball fields, and the park they are connected to, have generated a few posts, linked below.

the corridor and the dying robin

I just saw three owls

an owl flies over me FOUR times

~ ~ ~

I put up a post with this owl photo on Facebook within minutes of the sighting. The baseball diamonds are close to my home and my window was open, so I could hear her squawking as I typed up the post. 

Also, iPhones do a weird thing when you take a photo in low light—it takes a long exposure and somehow stabilizes the picture. So, this bit of image trickery gave me a picture that looked like it was taken at noon on an overcast day. It didn’t look anything like what I saw that night. So, I did some photoshopping to get it to match the deep blue of the night sky.

Raw image without any photoshop doctoring

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And here are three more pictures from the same area. Click on any image for a HI-rez view:

Great-horned owl on the backstop for the standard sized diamond (2021) 

Barred owl at twilight on the hiking path (2021)

From July 2022, along the same hiking path

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Longmire and owls

This image wasn't actually in the final episode of season three, this is a promotional photo.

The A&E series Longmire features owls in their mythic role as a totem of death. This series has lots of native American lore mixed in with the narrative, and the owl mythos plays an overt role. The owl is a symbol for death and messenger, and the script writers aren't shy about using this in the story.

  caution: spoilers below  

symbolic owl on the first episode of LONGMIRE

The opening scene of the very first episode features an owl. The main character and series namesake, Walt Longmire (played by Australian actor Robert Taylor) is at his little cabin in the morning and he looks out the window to see an owl. As I watched this first episode, seeing this owl, I immediately said, uh-oh somebody died. Up until this point, there had been no dialog, and the next thing that happens is the phone rings and his deputy says there's been a murder. We also later find out that the sheriff's life, is haunted by the memories of his dead wife.

An owl shows up again in season two, episode one, where sheriff Longmire is all alone, pursuing a villainous escaped prisoner in a winter mountain environment. Longmire falls into a creek, and sees an owl as he climbs out of the water. His life is in danger because of the cold, and he has a trippy hallucinations (or visions) as he tries to get warm again. He later kills the villain. So, the owl as a warning, proceeding a visionary state, ending in death. All the good mythology.

An owl shows up in the season three finale, right after Walt spreads the ashes of his wife. This scene coincides with some cross cutting of his deputy who "might" have killed his own father with a shotgun.

two pictures, same owl!

Above left is a photo of myself along with an owl. Above right is the author of the Longmire series of books, Craig Johnson, and oddly enough—he is pictured with the very same owl! Also note our choice of shirts.

This owl, with a wounded left wing, lives at the Teton Raptor Center in Wilson Wyoming. I have some funny synchronicities with that owl that I still need to post. More soon.

note any similarities?

Above left is one of Craig Johnson's books (he has a few books with owls on the cover). Above right is another book, and all I can say is that it should be out soon. The blue cover is a work-in-progress for my own book. I had no idea about this guy's book when I picked the name for my own. Both authors have 12 letters in their name. My initial set of owl experiences happened in Wyoming, the setting for the Longmire series (although the show is shot on location in New Mexico).

Now, it's not just me, there are others out there searching for owl references in the media soup. Like this site (HERE) that gave me a sense of relief that I'm not alone. And HERE too, this site featuring Twin Peaks.

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Owls in mythology

What follows is an excerpt from a book in progress. This is the opening segment of the chapter on owls in mythology. Please do not reproduce (but linking is fine).

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Myth is the secret opening through which the inexhaustible energies of the cosmos pour into human manifestation... 

Joseph Campbell (1904-1987)

Hero with a Thousand Faces

The power of myth 

When asked to define mythology in one sentence, comparative mythologist Joseph Campbell said that would be like trying to define life in a single sentence. He then went on to say that his simplest on-the-street definition of myth would be a story told almost exclusively in symbolic terms. 

Mythology as a word has two parts, the prefix myth, which by most definitions equates to a fable, or something that isn’t true. All too often the word myth implies a purely fictitious narrative that was told and re-told throughout ancient cultures. The suffix ology means “the study of,” so mythology means the study of myths. Looking in the dictionary, the word myth means something that is not true, a widely held but false belief or idea. When using the term myth, most people will hear it as something without any meaningful value. 

mythologist Joseph Campbell

Campbell spoke of two schools of thought on the study of myth. The objectivitist would view myth as nothing more than primitive fairy tales, something obsolete. A dusty book on a shelf, full of old fables that can be scrutinized by the rational academic.

The second school, the subjectivists, would see myths as something much more vital, a timeless reflections of universal truths, values and archetypes. Myths carry a significance in our lives, playing an important role. As I proceed forward, I will be weighting the subjectivist side of the scale with a disproportionate zeal. If the ideas in this book seem biased towards the mystical, that’s because they are. 

Campbell also said, “Myths are clues to the spiritual potentialities of the human life.”

Intro to owl myths

The owl has two major symbolic meanings. One is wisdom, the other is death. These divergent meanings probably stem from the owl itself. With their huge eyes and intense gaze, they have an aura of intelligence and regal serenity. A biologist would see those huge eyes as a well evolved tools for hunting in the dark, the poet would see those same eyes as being able to penetrate into your soul. Owls don’t simply appear as wise, they seem too wise. So much so that they come across as mystical.

Owls can see into the darkness, and this is the overriding metaphor for it’s spiritual powers. It can see into the other world, the underworld, the realm of the dead or the dark world. Like the shaman, the owl can travel to the other realms and then come back with it’s message. The owl as messenger is interwoven into much of this lore, whether delivering wisdom or a portent of death.

The ancient owl motif is connected to the feminine. The day is masculine and the night is feminine, with the sun and moon as counterparts. The 28-day lunar cycle equates to a woman’s cycle. Owls tend to gravitate towards goddesses and fertility icons. In ancient Babylon, the hooting of an owl at night was thought to meant the cries of a woman who had died in childbirth, now searching for her lost baby. This is a grim insight into an era where giving birth was dangerous, often the cause of a young woman’s death.

Owl as night omen

The owl, as a symbol, can be a total downer. This role is paralleled across the ages and across almost every mythic tradition, the owl is seen as an evil omen. Nighttime must have had an entirely different meaning before the electric lightbulb, and all sorts of folklore evolved that painted the darkness as something ominous and sinister. The owl represents the night, and thus it became the totem for all the menacing things hidden in the dark. That includes the internal darkness of the mind and the subconscious. Goya, no stranger to metaphoric symbolism, used owls (along with bats and cats) in a depiction of a nightmare. In his 1799 etching, The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters, a group of sinister owls hovers over the tortured sleeper.

Goya’s The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters

Owls and death

Darkness, the domain of the owl is equated with death. This connection is easy to understand, the owl is an animal of the night, rarely seen in the daylight. Death, darkness and owls can all be seen as sinister. Even today, seeing an owl can be unsettling, there is something about them that projects a menacing intensity. In China, the owl is called the bird who snatches away souls.

For most of the world’s cultures, the owl is an ominous sign. Many traditions believed that merely hearing it’s screech in the night was a harbinger of death. In Hungary, the owl is called the bird of death. This storyline continues right now in real stories from real people. I have collected a wealth reports of owls showing up either right before a loved one dies or just after, so many that they get their own chapter.

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“Mom, is that you?”

Barred owl, photo taken February 16, 2017. Click on image for HI-rez view.

Last Friday morning at 8:35, Andrea had a photo of an owl show up in her Facebook chat box (see above). The text under the image asked, “Andrea, this owl is on my deck. Do you think it might be injured?”

The message was from Andrea’s friend Suzanne. I was sitting nearby and she showed me the picture. My sense was that it looked fine. Andrea replied and asked when it showed up.

What then took place was a real time back and forth dialogue about the owl right out her window. Suzanne told us over Facebook that her mother had recently died, and that: “Today is my Mom’s birthday.” She had been crying earlier that morning, still grieving over the loss. Her mom had always been a good listener and she desperately wanted to talk to her.

She sat down and took some time to meditate after crying. Her intention was to process her feelings of confusion and loss. It was right when opening her eyes after meditating that she first saw the owl. She remarked that the way the window was lined up she would not have noticed it if she was seated even just a few inches off to either side. Her immediate thought was, “Mom, is that you?”

She tapped on the window and the owl slowly turned its head, its eyes wide open and staring at her. It was at this point that she took the photo (above) and sent it to Andrea.

Suzanne wrote, “So gorgeous… Never seen one so close.”

I was getting the play-by-play as Andrea read each of the incoming messages. When I heard that Suzanne’s mother had recently died I immediately blurted out, “Talk to the owl as if it is your Mom.” My comment was because of all the accounts I'd collected of people talking to owls after a loved one (most often a parent) had passed. 

Suzanne couldn't get out onto the deck because of deep snow, so she opened the window to talk, “It looked at me for several minutes with those eyes and then flew into a tree. Has to be her.”

The owl had sat on the deck chair for about an hour, and then spent about five minutes in a pine tree close to the house. She said this short time felt endless. 

In a follow up phone conversation I asked Suzanne her thoughts on the owl. She said that before noticing the owl she felt alone and despondent. Since the sighting, “I just felt an amazing connection, I don’t feel alone.” 

For the whole rest of that day she felt like crying, “It was so moving, but I wasn’t grieving. The tears are not of despair.”

She had lived in that house for over eight years, and never once seen an owl. 

Her mom would have been 95 years old on the day of this owl sighting, February 17, 2017. If you leave out the zero, the calendar date repeats itself in the year, 2/17 is 2017. 

Suzanne is a psychotherapist, and like so many of the other people who have described similar owl experiences, she is trained in Reiki.

A few days after the owl sighting on her back deck, Suzanne said this, “I am convinced that the visit was also a message to me to take care of business. The business of letting go ... and to commit to my work and my purpose here. Even if it means facing down the loneliness for the time being. But I am not alone. The owl did not seem to leave the yard. I believe it is still around my home.”

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I am indebted to all the people who have shared their stories with me. I realize that I've become a sort of archivist for people's personal exerinces. There is a responsibility to do more than just catalog these accounts and tuck them away in file cabinets. There is a need to share. My hope is that the people who find these little reports will end up being just a little more open to the deeper aspects of our reality.                        

—Mike Clelland.  

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owls and a mournful call

great horned owl

I saw an owl tonight, actually two of them.

It started on a bike ride heading north from my house to town, I had been writing about owls all day and my head was swimming with owl imagery and thoughts, the tape loop still grinding away as I rode the bike trail. It was a gray afternoon and for the first time this fall, it was starting to feel cold. The area along the bike path is mostly open flat horse pasture. At one point as I rode along I heard a mournful harsh squawking. I looked up to the telephone poles to see what it might be. I am an okay birder, and it sounded like it might be a hawk, but my mind thought owl. The squawk was ringing out at very defined intervals, perhaps once every 20 seconds or so. It was coming from a cluster of cottonwoods, all rusty gold with the season.

I got off my bike, walked through the dry grass to the barbed wire fence and stayed still looking and listening. The squawking seemed so sad, and it continued at steady intervals, but I didn’t see anything. It was definitely coming from that set of trees, but whatever bird was making the noise was hidden from my view. I got back on the bike and continued to town.

On the way back from, now riding south, I heard the same sound again, and this time I saw a bird on the back side of this stand of trees. No way to tell what it might be from that distance so I set my bike down again and walked up to the same barbed wire fence but a few hundred yards north from where I stood earlier.

The squawking continued and I could see the outline of the body and it sure looked like an owl. I shimmied under the fence and walked towards it to get a better look.

I had spent the day writing about the owls heightened ability to see and hear, so I was hyper aware that there was no way I could sneak up on it. I got fairly close and in the steely twilight I realized I was looking at a great horned owl.

All this time it continued that melancholy squawking at a steady interval. As i stood below it, I heard a faint response off to the west. The owl in the tree near me would squawk loudly, and just a second later I would hear the exact same call but way off in the distance. At first I wondered if it was an echo, but that would be unlikely in this big open terrain.

I turned my head for a few seconds to see where the faint noise might be coming from, and in that moment the owl dropped off the tree. When I looked back the owl was in flight, coasting slowly with what seemed to be impossibly large wings given that she only looked to be about a foot tall in the tree.

I watched her drop down to the hug the ground level and I lost sight of her as dipped low. Eventually I saw her reappear and alight on a big hay barn about a quarter of a mile from where I stood. Seconds later I saw another owl land on that same barn and one or the other of them took off. When I walked back to my bike there was only one owl on that barn.

Curiously, that was the very same barn where I had my picture taken with a great horned owl. This happened last summer, and I wrote about it, and the follow up synchronicity here. And equally curious the owl was doing some of the things I had just been writing about. Dropping from tree branches, flying oddly slow and hugging the ground as it flew.

I got home and search out that mournful screech, you can hear it on this page, about half way down a set of audio players. The audio is titled: Female squawk. This is an exact match, including the length of the interval between calls. It’s because of this that I am referring to this owl as a she.

This post comes the day after a posting a series of extremely bizarre owl sychronicities, involving driveways and laundry, linked here.

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Text added Oct. 13th, the following day from the post above

I feel pretty sure I saw two owls today, both of them were quite far away.  I am saying they were probably owls by the chubby barrel shape of their bodies. One was on the same hay barn as I wrote about yesterday. The other was in a tree. I saw them while driving. Not much to say, I feel like the ones way off in the distance don't have much synchro-resonance. That said, four in two days is a lot.

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owl and hawk in Phoenix

  click on any image for a high-rez view  

1.“Something doesn't look right here! 

Wait, there are more than two wings here!!! That looks like a red tail!??”



This was the first image (above) in a series of photos posted by Jujuolui Kuita on her Facebook wall. She's an emergency animal tech, and was called out to a location in suburban Phoenix because of an "injured owl." When she arrived on the scene there was something up in a tree, but it was initially hard to make out what it might be.



2. An owl face in among the wings



Eventually she saw the face of a great horned owl peering out from a tangle of wings. She was unclear of what she was seeing—there was more than just an owl stuck up in that tree. Jujuolui went and got a ladder from the truck.



3. "Just set the ladder, 

suddenly, the red-tailed hawk came falling down!"



The motion of the ladder bumping the tree must have startled the owl enough to free itself from the dead hawk that had been stuck on top of it.



4. The dead hawk now on the ground.




5. Without the weight of the hawk on him, 

the owl was able to get free and fly away—seeking safety in this tree.




6. Jujuolui holding the dead hawk

She was terribly saddened that this big beautiful hawk had died. What made this even more upsetting was that there was another hawk perched high in a nearby tree. This second hawk seemed distressed, and was watching what was happening below. They realized this was probably the female mate to the dead male hawk on the ground.



7.  Female red-tailed way up at the top in a nearby tree, 

with her mate on the ground below her. 




8. Jujuoli labeled this photo: "Sorry for your loss."

Jujuolui contacted Wild at Heart, an Arizona-based raptor rescue center, and they suggested that she leave the body of the hawk under the tree so the female could realize he had died and begin the grieving process. She labeled the photo: "Sorry for your loss."


Jujuolui told me she cried at the base of that tree, "It was really sad. I felt the intense pain of the female hawk."

*     *     *

Something happened in that tree. There had been a battle between an owl and a hawk, but why they fought no one will ever know. Perhaps one bird had had gotten into the other’s territory. Maybe the owl was attempting to take over the nest of the hawk. 

Why were they stuck together? It seems that the weight of the dead hawk had pinned the owl into the branches. Could the fight have left the owl injured? Or, maybe it was left too exhausted to free itself from the hawk it had killed. Perhaps their talons ended up locked together. Whatever the cause, Jujuolui was allowed an interesting and rare glimpse into animal behavior. 

But what is even more fascinating is that Jujuolui is a lifelong experiencer of UFO contact, and a few of these events involved owls. There is a powerful symbolic aspect not only to what happened with the owl and hawk, but that someone with UFO experiences would be “called” to that tree. 

She was well aware of the significance and said so in the comment thread below her own photos. She wrote: “I felt there was some omen to this… I felt like just a spectator,” and, “I think there is much symbolism to this event!”

Jujuolui confronted two raptors, both imbued with ancient lore, one a symbol of the night and the other the day. One represents death, the other the power of life. The owl is an inward totem, representing the secrets of the unseen worlds. The hawk is a bold emblem of strength and courage. The owl was victorious, yet pinned down by the weight of the defeated. And it was a UFO experiencer, someone who has crossed the boundaries between the worlds that freed it from burden of it’s shadow spirit. She used a ladder to free the owl, and in dream symbolism the ladder could mean spiritual ascension or climbing to higher level of self discovery. 

Another thing that struck me was this happened in Phoenix, a city named after the mythic bird, the symbol of death in flames and rebirth from the ashes. When I pointed this out to her she said, “I know, how fascinating! I was told in a 'dream' that I was to move to this city. It was after everything I owned burned up!”

I contacted her and asked some questions, the first being the same I would ask anyone: “What was going on in your life during the lead up to this event?”

She replied that her life at the time had been extremely difficult, she had been feeling hopeless and depressed. I had initially edited these personal details out of the first draft, but she said, “I don't mind you sharing that. It is true and it might give hope to others who are in need of looking inward for strength and guidance.”

Her dog Katrina had died recently, and she was grieving over the loss of her best friend and companion. Jujuolui is extremely empathic, and the animal rescue work can be emotionally challenging. One of the patterns I have seen in this research is that people who have had these contact experiences will often be working with animals. That and a profound sense of empathy. 

The night before the owl and hawk event she had asked for help. Just before going to bed she sought guidance from her star-family (including her dog Katian) on three problems . She said, “My dream that [next] morning was my guides telling me they solved two out of the three problems/issues I have asked help on! I don't know which issues they were! Ha!”

I explained that it felt like something symbolic that might only be understood at the unconscious level of the archetype. She replied, “I knew it meant something and I felt honored to be a part of this event. It was very sad.”

She was clear that what happened was definitely a “pay attention” moment.

Jujuolui has been outspoken her experiences, and is the subject of full chapter in the recent book Meet the Hybrids by Barbara Lamb and Miguel Mendonça. She also published her own book in 2012 We Are Among You Already. 

One of her owl stories was featured on page 211 in my book The Messengers. Like the owl and the hawk account here, this one also features her photograph of a great horned owl. Jujuolui's excerpt is posted HERE.

photo by Jujuolui Kuita

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owls and Anne Strieber

Now that it's finally springtime I've been riding my bike to town, I do this daily. There is a great big nest up in a cottonwood tree right where the bike lane along the highway crosses a creek and then veers off to its own bike trail.

This nest is home to a Great Horned Owl. I've been taking binoculars along with me on some days when I ride to town. I'll sit in the grass for a few minutes and focus on this amazing creature. Mostly all you can see is just it's cat-like head poking up above the huge nest. It's been wonderful to have this chance to see something so beautiful.

In the early evening of Tuesday April 30th I was riding my bike home from my little downtown. I had my iPod on shuffle and the sun was setting. As I approached this corner in the highway closest to the big nest one song faded off and I waited for the next one to start. Instead of music I heard Anne Strieber's voice.

"Hi subscribers, this is Anne Strieber..."

Anne is Whitley Strieber's wife and she has been hosting a series of special interviews where she talks with close encounter witnesses. What I was hearing was the very first in this series from January of 2010, and I was the guest.

Her voice came on just as I was slowing down to see if I could catch sight of the owl. The sun was setting and the closest spot for a view lined up exactly behind the big nest making for some dramatic backlighting. There was really only one good spot to get a view, it was a narrow opening along the scrubby bushes and aspen trees that lined the highway. From this one place I could see the owl's head and the silhouette of it's tufted "ears." There was literally a halo around the owl and I was staring directly into a shimmering aurora with an owl at it's center.

It was at this moment, as I was standing with my bike, that I realized this was the interview with me. I have a ton of stuff crammed onto my iPod, including a lot of audio interviews. I feel like I've downloaded most of Anne's subscriber series with the close encounter witnesses. The chances of this interview popping up at this moment was striking.

What I also realized was right at that moment Anne was having brain surgery to remove a (non-cancerous) tumor called a meningioma.

Before heading to town on my bike I had read this facebook message from her husband, Whitley:

Anne is in surgery now. There are probably about nine or ten hours to go. It is a very meticulous, exacting surgery. Pray for my wonderful girl!

So I saw an owl backlit by the setting sun while listening to Anne's voice introducing me while she was having a very serious operation on her brain.

This was an impressive cluster of points all in alignment at that moment; the sun, the owl, Anne's voice, Anne's surgery, plus me and my experiences. I am pretty sure this is a female owl sitting on her eggs. So I was looking at an image of motherhood in this same straight line.

Some of the mythology surrounding the owl is steeped in foreboding and death. But I felt none of that, the experience was delightful and inspiring.

Up until yesterday I had only seen one owl in that nest. While riding home last night I did the same thing, I stopped my bike at the break in the trees to look at the nest and I was delighted to see two owls. Both of them were looking right at me. One stayed low in the nest (I assume sitting on eggs) and the other one hopped from one branch to another. This second owl eventually flew to another tree.

The very first day I looked through my binoculars to get a better view of the owl, at the moment I initially focused on the owl's face—it winked at me!

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(more)

Also, in the summer of 2011 I had an experience of seeing an owl in an exact alignment with the full moon.

This same corner, where the bike path converges with the highway lines up with a bridge across a creek. This site has been the location of a series of blog posts. One with an old girlfriend and an owl (here). One with two owls crossing my path (here). And one with a deer (here).

Anne Strieber's journal as she waited to go into surgery (here)

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