birding-aus

Do Powerful Owls eat carrion?

To: Birding_Aus <>
Subject: Do Powerful Owls eat carrion?
From: Chris Brandis <>
Date: Mon, 21 Mar 2016 08:52:16 +0000
If POs do not take prey off the ground then how do the catch cats as I 
have seen to cases of a PO with a cat, well half a cat, one black and 
white and one ginger, near Shellharbour, NSW, unless the cats were up a 
tree.
Cheers

On 21/03/2016 1:19 PM, Philip Veerman wrote:
> I suspect Tony missed the point of the question. Or maybe I have. Or is the 
> question about whether possums are made sick from eating rat poison (or even 
> poisoned rats). I think the question is concern for the owls if they eat dead 
> poisoned rats. We know that Powerful Owls eat possums so that point is far 
> from "impossumble" (ha ha). At this month's COG meeting Jerry Olsen talked 
> about local raptors and made the point that Powerful Owls eat only animals 
> caught in the tree level (arboreal). They are not interested in eating rats 
> or other terrestrial fauna. Terestrail fauna apparently does not show in 
> their pellets. Whether that is consistent throughout their range (well it 
> likely is). So I would suggest on that, that the threat of poisoning from 
> eating dead rats should be minimal to nonexistent. How would they find it? 
> Although there is the recent photo of a PO holding shorts at a day time roost 
> (presumably caught off someone's clothes line).
>
> Philip
>
> -----Original Message-----From: Birding-Aus 
>  On Behalf Of Tony Russell
> Sent: Monday, 21 March 2016 11:26 AM  To: 'Michael Norris'; 
>        Subject: Re: [Birding-Aus] Do Powerful Owls 
> eat carrion?
>
> I think you'll find it not impossumble that the owl had possumbly killed the 
> possae.
>
> Tony.
>
> -----Original Message-----From: Birding-Aus 
>  On Behalf Of Michael Norris  
> Sent: Monday, March 21, 2016 10:12 AM   To:  
> Subject: [Birding-Aus] Do Powerful Owls eat carrion?
>
> The other day I saw a Powerful Owl near my home in suburban Melbourne, 16km 
> from the CBD.  It was in a garden where a number of possums have been found 
> dead so I’d like to know if these owls eat carrion.   My concern is that 
> current rat baits can accumulate in the bodies of vertebrates that scavenge 
> on corpses.
>
> Michael Norris
>
>
>
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