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Barn Owl Pellet Analysis and Dissection - The Barn Owl Trust

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Barn Owl Pellet Analysis and Dissection - The Barn Owl Trust

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What are Barn Owl pellets?

Barn Owls are unable to digest the fur and bone of their prey, which they usually swallow whole.

The indigestible parts are regurgitated (coughed up through the beak) in the form of an owl pellet.

After feeding, producing a pellet takes 6 hours or more.

After each night's hunting an owl regurgitates 1 or 2 pellets.

Barn Owl pellets are typically about the size of a man's thumb and black when fresh.

Pellets often contain the remains of 4 or 5 small mammals.

Pellet dissection can tell you exactly what an owl has eaten.

What is a Barn Owl pellet? - a 4 minute video with David Ramsden from the Barn Owl Trust.

Where to find Barn Owl pellets

Pellets often accumulate at roosting or nesting sites, where owls can hide away and shelter from the weather. There are several signs of Barn Owl occupation to look out for, which help decide if the pellets are from Barn Owls or from a different bird.
Take care if collecting pellets from the wild as Barn Owls are a protected species and it is illegal to disturb them while breeding. However, it's likely that any owl nest is high above you and if you are quietly collecting pellets on the ground you are probably not going to disturb the owls.

Bird pellet identity chart: Identify the bird pellets you find. Most birds produce pellets, which look different according to what they eat. Barn Owl pellets are black when fresh and dark grey when dry.

Owl pellet storage and preparation

Fresh owl pellets can be dried or frozen, and kept in an airtight container. If moist pellets are stored together they can become a congealed mass of pellet debris. If pellets are stored in a sealed container a number of grubs or small moths may be found once the container is reopened. These are clothes moths and their grubs are completely harmless (except to wool).

Barn Owl pellet analysis

In dry well-used roost sites lots of Barn Owl pellets can accumulate. Using our owl pellet age guide photo on the right, it's possible to work out how long Barn Owls have been using the site and how recently the owl was present.

Barn Owl pellets break down with age as clothes moths eat the fur, leaving the tiny bones behind, which can last for many years.

Barn Owl pellet dissection

Pellets can be analysed wet or dry. It is easier to analyse dry pellets, but to extract all of the small mammal bones intact, dried pellets can be soaked in water for 24 hours.

Gently tease the pellet apart using your fingers or tweezers. Although pellets do not smell, (they are not faeces) hands should be washed thoroughly with soap and water after this activity.

Barn Owl pellet contents identification

Many thousands of Barn Owl pellets have been analysed so we know a great deal about what Barn Owl's hunt and eat.

Wild Barn Owls eat mainly small mammals such as voles, shrews and mice. Other less common items include rats, birds and frogs.

The simplest way to identify which small mammals have been eaten is to search for the lower jaw bones, then 'pair up' the right and left jaws from each pellet.

The shapes of the bones, particularly the jawbones, can tell you what species of animal the owl has eaten. You can also count how many prey items are contained within an individual pellet.
Take a look at a our photos of owl pellet analysis to help you to identify bones
Barn Owl pellet analysis and dissection for schools - free* PDF to download. Includes owl pellet analysis diagrams.
*Free for personal and educational use only - copyright Barn Owl Trust.

Contains everything you need for owl pellet dissection - including a real Barn Owl pellet! Natural science straight from the owl's mouth! Owl pellet analysis is a fascinating activity for adults and children. You can buy the packs from our online shop.

Other relevant pages:

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Barn Owl Pellet Analysis and Dissection - The Barn Owl Trust

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What are Barn Owl pellets? Barn Owls are unable to digest the fur and bone of their prey, which they usually swallow whole. The indigestible parts are regurgitated (coughed up through the beak) in the form of an owl pellet. After feeding, producing a pellet takes 6 hours or more.

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What are owl pellets? Facts for kids from the Barn Owl Trust

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What are owl pellets? Facts for kids from the Barn Owl Trust

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Watch a Barn Owl regurgitate (cough up) an owl pellet in this video:
Female barn owl regurgitates owl pellet - video from Audubon Starr Ranch, Ca
Facts about owl pellets

Pellets are the undigested parts of a bird's food, such as hair or bones, which are regurgitated (coughed up through the beak).

Many kinds of birds produce pellets including birds of prey, crows and even sparrows. The appearance depends on what they eat.

All owls produce pellets and dissecting them is a great way to find out what different owls eat!

Owl pellets are not droppings - and they do not smell!

Barn Owl pellets are black when fresh and gradually turn grey as they dry out.

Barn Owl pellets are fascinating to investigate and analyse - be a scientist, by gently pulling the pellet apart to see what it is made from. Record your findings in a notebook with drawings or photos. Why do you think there is a ruler in the photo of a Field Vole skull?

Wild Barn Owls in the UK feed mainly on voles, shrews and mice, which are usually swallowed whole.

Barn Owl pellets contain the undigested fur and bones of as many as 6 small mammals!
Occasionally, very unusual remains may be found such as moles or frogs.

You can identify what animal the bones came from by looking at the skull and measuring the jaw bones.

Bird bones and even bird rings are sometimes found too. A Barn Owl pellet from Essex contained a BTO ring that had been fitted to a wren in Northumberland - 300 miles away!

How to dissect and analyse a Barn Owl pellet: Download a free* Barn Owl pellet analysis worksheet - (Suitable for use in schools.)
*Free for personal and educational use only - copyright Barn Owl Trust.

Buy a pellet dissection pack direct from the Barn Owl Trust - everything you need, including a real Barn Owl pellet for you to dissect!

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What are owl pellets? Facts for kids from the Barn Owl Trust

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Watch a Barn Owl regurgitate (cough up) an owl pellet in this video: Female barn owl regurgitates owl pellet - video from Audubon Starr Ranch, Ca Facts about owl pellets Pellets are the undigested parts of a bird's food, such as hair or bones, which are regurgitated (coughed up through the beak).

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How to clean animal bones - the complete guide : Jake's Bones

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How to clean animal bones - the complete guide : Jake's Bones

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Back in 2009 I wrote a post about how to clean up animal bones. Over the last three years that has always been my most popular post on the site, but I have learned a lot since then so in October 2012 I wrote this new page, all about cleaning bones.

You don't need to clean every bone you find. If it has been out in the open, doesn't have any soft tissue on it, and doesn't smell, then it is pretty much clean. It is rare to get diseases from any kind of bone like this. the bone does smell then I use rubber gloves to handle it until it's clean.

This is my personal guide. This is what I have found out from five years of bone collecting. Other people might have different ideas but these are the ones which work for me.

There are eight good and two bad techniques to clean bones, but I have missed out one of the good ones because it was told to me as a secret. A lot depends on what state the bones are in at the start. I prefer to leave the bones until have no soft tissue left but that isn't always possible, especially if it's small animal where the bones are small and might get lost

To begin with, what condition are the bones in already ? Are they dry with no soft tissue, do they have some flesh attached, or is the animal recently dead ? Choose from the top row, then look down the column to see which are good ways to clean the bones. There is more about each method below.

This means this is a good way of cleaning the bones

This means it might work, but it might not, or that it might work but it is messy or smelly

This means I do not recommend doing this at all.

Biological washing powder can be bought from supermarkets and is the type of powder used for cleaning clothes in a washing machine. It is very cheap. Some people recommend Biotex but I have never used it.

Biological washing powder contains enzymes are tiny, tiny organisms which break down fat and soft tissue. You add the powder to hot or warm water (not boiling water, see below) and leave bones in for usually a few days. It helps if the water is kept warm in this time. After you finish, rinse the bones really well other wise the enzymes will keep eating the bone. Then dry them using the method below.

This method is the one recommended to me by museums. It's cheap and easy to do, as long as there is only a very small amount of soft tissue left, or none at all.

UPDATE, NOVEMBER 2012: I now use the Super Superb Skull and Skeleton Sterilising System I invented but some people use a slow cooker.

Hydrogen peroxide is a chemical which bleaches the bone without damaging it. It can be difficult to get hold of in large quantities. For even a small skull, you might need one or two litres. Chemists sell it in very small bottles, but I buy it from hairdresser supply stores. It is difficult to buy large quantities because you can make bombs from it. I can't buy the highest concentration now (12%) but I can still buy 9% and 6%. Hydrogen peroxide at 12% is also known as "40-strength". It costs about £4 a litre.The liquid version is much better than the creme version, because the creme version will foam up after a while and overflow.

When you take out the bones, rinse them well in a bucket of cold water otherwise you will get white powder residue on the bones. You can reuse the peroxide a few times. It seems to be reused better when it hasn't been exposed to much air. If it's warmer, the peroxide will work better.

Peroxide will not dissolve soft tissue or flesh but it can soften the tissue to make it easier to remove. It also sterilises the bone.

Dermestid beetles are beetles that eat dead flesh. They are kept in special tanks, and kept warm and constantly fed with dead things. They are tiny, smaller than a fingernail, but they can eat a lot of flesh in a small time leaving the bone nice and clean.

Burying a dead body might seem obvious but it is not as good as leaving the bones above ground. If you need to bury, leave the body above ground for a day or so in warm weather so flies can lay eggs which make maggots which eat the flesh.

I buried this fox, my squirrel and a fallow deer head. The difficult part is knowing when to dig up. The fallow deer head wasn't properly done and still needed lots and lots of cleaning afterwards. It would have been better to leave it for a another couple of months.

I wrapped the fox in the wire mesh to keep the bones together and to stop other animals if they dug it up (they didn't). For small animals you can wrap in a muslin bag , which is a thin material.

If you bury in the wrong type of soil, like sand or very wet soil, it can actually preserve the body !

Rotting soft tissue in water is horrible and smelly. I recommend you do not do it if its near anyone else that can smell it.

I have used soaking in cold water for when the body is skeletonised but there are still tendons attached like in the picture above. The water softens the tendons and makes them easier to cut.

When someone shoots a stag with a gamekeeper there, the gamekeeper will usually offer to mount the skull as a present. To do it quickly (usually the next day) he will cut off the fur skin and most of the flesh, and simmer (not boil) it in a big pot until the flesh falls off.

WARNING: If you do this in a Le Creuset pan your mother WILL shout at you and you WILL get grounded for forever.

This is generally not the best way for most people. It is messy and smelly, but it is quick.Adding biological washing powder can help too.

UPDATE, NOVEMBER 2012: I now use the Super Superb Skull and Skeleton Sterilising System I invented but some people use a slow cooker.

UPDATE, DECEMBER 2013: This is now the method I use the most. I use a slow cooker, and add biological washing powder. I normally leave it overnight on "High" when my mum is away, because the small of the biological washing powder is not good.

WARNING: I have had one juvenile red deer skull which fell apart into dust after being simmered for a second time. I'm not sure what I did wrong, whether it was too long (it was 13 hours), too much biological washing powder, whether the water was too hot, or whether I added cold water too quickly. I recommend only going this for about six hours, on medium, and let it cool down slowly afterwards.

PRO TIP: If your mother doesn't know you use her slow cooker for cleaning bones, try to not mention it on live, prime-time television.

NEVER PUT BONES IN BOILING WATER. This makes any fat present thinner, so it can soak inside the actual bone, and it will lock the fat inside the bone when it cools. The fat will come to the surface over time and make your bones look rubbish and horrible.

If you have boiled bones already, try using biological washing powder to get rid of the fat.

DO NOT CLEAN BONES WITH BLEACH. It damages the surface of the bone. Use hydrogen peroxide instead.

x

However you cleaned your bones, rinse them thoroughly. I then leave them outside to dry in the air for a few days. After that, I put them on a tray covered in newspaper, and let them dry near a heater. DO NOT PUT THEM ON A HEATER OR A RADIATOR OR ANYTHING HOT BECAUSE THEY WILL CRACK. Leave the bones out for two or three days, even after they seem dry enough.

If there is any dirt left, I use a toothbrush to take it off. It should come off easily.

Wet bones often look dirty but don't panic ! Look how these badger bones came out the water brown, but they dried grey ! Nothing was done to them between these two pictures, they just dried:

Sometimes you end up with tiny amounts of soft tissue left after cleaning the bone. You can tell by the horrible smell. This is bad and fiddly to solve

You can try and remove it with tweezers,wire or high pressure water from a hosepipe. Bugs usually won't eat it once it's been through peroxide or biological washing powder, but you can leave it out to dry and drop off.

In this fallow deer jaw, there was soft tissue that was hard to reach in the root canal. I pushed down a cable tie and used it to 'floss' the dead flesh out. Then I used high pressure water from a hosepipe to push the bits out.

Don't. Just don't.

If you must, try cooking them instead.

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How to clean animal bones - the complete guide

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Back in 2009 I wrote a post about how to clean up animal bones. Over the last three years that has always been my most popular post on the site, but I have learned a lot since then so in October 2012 I wrote this new page, all about cleaning bones.

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Skulls Unlimited: World Leader in Real/Replica Skulls & Skeletons

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Skulls Unlimited: World Leader in Real/Replica Skulls & Skeletons

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Skulls Unlimited: World Leader in Real/Replica Skulls & Skeletons

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Skulls Unlimited is the world's leading supplier of osteological specimens. Complete selection of legally-obtained animal skulls and replicas.

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Browse by Bird Family (taxonomy), All About Birds - Cornell Lab of Ornithology

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Browse by Bird Family (taxonomy), All About Birds - Cornell Lab of Ornithology

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Browse by Bird Family (taxonomy), All About Birds - Cornell Lab of Ornithology

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"Owl sounds" 15 minutes - Amazing "Nature Sounds" - YouTube

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"Owl sounds" 15 minutes - Amazing "Nature Sounds" - YouTube

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Forest Night Sounds Of Owls Campfire Crickets Wolves

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"Owl sounds" 15 minutes - Amazing "Nature Sounds"

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Owl sounds carry across the night air, with many other sounds of the night in the background. Sit back and enjoy as a variety of owls with their unique voices can be heard calling each other , back and forth...