Owls

We have a pair of great horned owl "chicks" growing up on our farm.  The first time I noticed them was when I was cutting hay.  As I came down past the house grove I saw an owl walking along the edge of the field.  Since I can't recall ever seeing this I stopped the tractor to get a better look at it and noticed that it had the telltale horns of a great horned owl, but the color was much lighter than a normal owl.  The next time I saw the owl was again during haying and I saw that it was actually a pair.  The pair came, first one, then the other, and crash landed into the hay field.  They came out of the grove swooping up and down pivoting on their wings and ditching like a hang-glider landing on their bellies and tilting over onto their heads with feet up in the air and wings wide open.  When they pulled themselves back up right they just sat in the field and watched me go around in the tractor.  I called up to the house and everyone came down to take a look at them.  They stayed put in the field even with everyone standing just feet away.  A couple of days ago we even had one get caught in the portable netting that Sara uses to pen her goats in with.  We attempted to free the owl from the netting but the fearsome talons and the popping of its beak kept us from getting too close.  It didn't take long though and the owl was out of the netting and flying.  Who would have thought that such amazing flying predators would be so clumsy when they are young.