A big small surprise on the way home

A few days ago, Tommy and I were walking back home after a very long day and decided to stop by the park a few blocks from the house because the chorus of birds was amazing.

It was 5:44pm and was getting dark when we walked into the park to find what at first looked like an extra chunk of wood on one of the exercise logs on the 'gym' part of the park.

I was about 20 metres from it, with poor light, but still decided to try a pic of it (mostly to see what it was) I took one photo and tried to get closer. The thing sitting there flew!

It was a bird!! We rushed to the house as it was very hard to see the dark screen with such poor light. When we downloaded the camera's memory, we found this (click to enlarge)


It was a Peruvian Pygmy Owl, also known as Pacific Pygmy Owl (Glaucidium peruanum)

Do I REALLY have to tell you how excited we were?? A LIFER! By total chance, after a very long exhausting day... What a surprise!!

This Pygmy Owl is between 16.5 and 18 centimeters (6.5 to 7 inches) Apparently it is fairly common in dry woods, riparian forest, scrub and gardens. If you ask me, I've NEVER seen it before! It is also similar to the Andean Pygmy Owl, but found on drier woods. It is typically a grayer shade of brown and has white spots on scapulars and barring on remiges.

The songs on the Pacific slope are (according to the marvellous Birds of Peru guide) rapid rising hoots: "poop'poop'poop'poop..." To be honest, we didn't hear the song :(

The next day we were close to the park at about the same time, hoping to find it again, but we had no luck. Now that we know that this bird is a visitor on the route to the house, we don't hate the hill on the way home as much!