All 7 Owls in Florida [With Sounds & Pictures] (2024)

Nothing is more exciting than spotting an owl in your backyard if you live in Florida. These magnificent birds of prey are a beautiful sight to behold. If you’re an avid birdwatcher, you’re probably eager to identify which types of owls are visiting your property.

There are 7 owl species found in Florida, including the Burrowing Owl, Northern Saw-Whet Owl, Barn Owl, Short-Eared Owl, Eastern Screech-Owl, Barred Owl, and Great Horned Owl. While several of these owl species have their preferred mating and migratory ranges, it’s possible to spot a vagrant or irrupting owl in areas outside their known territories. If you see an owl in Florida that is not on this list, consider yourself lucky!

The legend below can be used to help you determine where each of the 7 owls of Florida lives during different parts of the year.

Overview

These small owls live in grasslands and deserts where they enjoy feeding on insects, small mammals, and reptiles. Burrowing owls are among only a handful of owls that prefer to hunt during the daytime, spending their nights tucked away in their dens. When burrows are not available to them, these highly adaptable birds make their homes in buckets, pipes, and tubing. Burrowing owls have a higher tolerance for carbon dioxide than other birds, enabling them to spend more time huddled up in a small space. These birds cleverly use dung to carpet their dens, which invites insects to visit, providing the birds with an easy meal. Burrowing owls have also been known to hoard shiny objects, such as bottle caps, paper clips, and bits of tin foil.

How to Identify

Burrowing owls have long legs and an upright posture. They also have vivid yellow eyes and although their red-brown plumage resembles both the barred and boreal owls, the fact that they live on the ground makes it easy to differentiate between these species. Burrowing owls are pretty quiet, with males producing high-pitched “coo-coos” to defend their territories and attract mates.

Burrowing Owl Range & Migration Map

Overview

These owls are short and compact. At just 8 inches in length and with a wingspan of 22 inches, northern saw-whet owls are among the smallest owls in the United States. Northern saw-whet owls like to prey on deer mice, using their sharp beaks to tear their prey into smaller pieces, breaking up a single mouse into several meals. Because these owls are nocturnal, and because they’re so small, they can be difficult to track. But their sharp cries make it easier to locate them in their forest homes. Northern saw-whet owls are mostly solitary creatures, only socializing with their mates. Females have been known to have two mates, leaving the first to raise a brood with the second. These owls have porphyrin pigments in their feathers, and when illuminated with a UV light, the ventral side of the wings shows a neon pink color. This helps researchers determine an owl’s age.

How to Identify

Named because its call sounds like a saw being sharpened on a whetstone, saw-whet owls have small heads and cat-like faces with relatively large yellow eyes. With rust-colored backs, breasts, and wings, northern saw-whet owls have spotted heads and distinctive Y-shaped markings on their faces. These owls use a variety of vocalizations to communicate. They’re most easily identified by their shrill “too-too-too” calls, which they use to attract mates. The cries of northern saw-whet owls are so loud that they can be heard nearly 1,000 feet away.

Northern Saw-whet Owl Range & Migration Map

Overview

Easily recognized by their pale heart-shaped faces, barn owls are some of the most widespread owls in the world. These owls thrive in deserts and grasslands, but can even be found in polar regions. Barn owls are especially common on farms, where they like to hunt for field mice among the crops in the morning and evening, and where they can take shelter in barns during the daytime. With their serrated wings, these fearsome predators fly noiselessly as they go in for the kill. Barn owls are monogamous, mating for life. They do not build nests but prefer to lay their eggs in the hollows of trees. The amount of food these birds receive has a direct impact on how many eggs they lay — the more voles, rats, and shrews they consume, the more owlets in their brood.

How to Identify

Barn owls are quite lanky compared to other owls. They have large hazel to brown eyes set in concave, heart-shaped faces that are surrounded by a delicate outline of pale brown feathers. Barn owls are milk white in color with tan and rust brown feathers on their backs and wings. These owls do not hoot but instead prefer to communicate via screeches.

Barn Owl Range & Migration Map

Overview

A classic birdwatcher favorite, short-eared owls hunt during the daytime and can be found throughout the United States. These owls are some of the few that prefer to build their own nests. Females construct their bowl-shaped nests in the ground, lining them with feathers, grasses, and other soft materials before laying clutches of 4 to 7 eggs. Short-eared owls have very distinctive flight patterns, with irregular wingbeats similar to that of bats or moths. These birds are typically 17 inches in length and have wingspans of up to 43 inches. They use their powerful wings to stay upright as they swoop feet-first to capture their prey, which consists of small mammals, rodents, reptiles, and amphibians. Short-eared owls sometimes dine on songbirds and will tear the wings off before swallowing them whole.

How to Identify

The ear tufts of the short-eared owl are situated towards the center of their heads, and they’re so short that sometimes they may not be visible at all. Short-eared owls have tawny plumage on their backs and wings with tan bellies that are interspersed with vertical dark brown streaks. Tailfeathers are barred. These owls have small, round faces with pale tan to creamy white facial disks accented by black-brimmed yellow eyes. Short-eared owls use sharp “waowk-waowk-waowk” calls to communicate and “eeee-yerp” cries during the mating season.

Short-eared Owl Range & Migration Map

Overview

Featuring 5 subspecies, eastern screech-owls are small birds maxing out at just under 10-inches in length. These owls are monogamous and less skittish than other owls, frequently living in nesting boxes and even using birdbaths to wash up. Eastern screech-owls are typically easy to spot because they prey on songbirds during the daytime. This little raptor’s size proves deceptive. These are highly territorial birds, even from a young age. Young eastern screech-owls will fight amongst themselves for food, and may even kill the smallest and weakest of their siblings — an act known as siblicide that is common in birds of prey.

How to Identify

Eastern screech-owls are short, stocky birds with small heads and square tails. These owls occur in gray morphs and red (or rufous) morphs, with some owls exhibiting brown plumage. The color of each eastern screech-owl depends on the type of forest it resides in, as its coloring helps to camouflage it from potential predators. These are very vocal owls that use trilling calls to attract mates and communicate with their families. Their distinctive whinny-like screeches are hard to miss!

Eastern Screech-Owl Range & Migration Map

Overview

Masters of camouflage, barred owls can be tough to spot. Fortunately, their loud hooting calls “Who cooks for you? Who cooks for you all?” are easy to hear. Barred owls prefer to dwell in forests where they can track down rabbits, squirrels, and even raccoons. These owls saw a serious population boom in the 20th century, expanding their range to include forestland in the western states. Barred owls tend to stay close to home throughout their lives, often only traveling around a 6-mile radius. Like barn owls, barred owls are monogamous and do most of their hunting at night.

How to Identify

With their deep brown eyes and gentle round faces, barred owls look exactly as you would expect owls to look. These birds are covered in red-brown feathers with white horizontal stripes or bars. Barred owls are most commonly spotted on the edges of forests at dusk, where they can easily locate their prey.

Barred Owl Range & Migration Map

Overview

Far from meek, Great Horned owls have been known to hunt other birds of prey, including ospreys, peregrines, and even other owls. With their strong talons, these birds can exert 28-pounds of force allowing them to tackle larger prey. Great orned owls are a major threat to other birds, especially jays and crows. In fact, if you ever hear a large group of these birds making a fuss, there’s a good chance it’s because a great horned owl has gotten too close to their nests. The great horned owl’s plumage is ultra-soft, and this provides the animals with several benefits. For starters, it protects them from the harsh cold. But it also muffles sound, allowing them to fly silently as they swoop down on their prey. Interestingly, although the females of the species are larger than the males, females have higher-pitched voices, and mated pairs often synchronize their calls.

How to Identify

The great horned owl is easily identified by a matching pair of tufts on either side of its head, giving it a horned appearance. They have gray to red-brown barred plumage and golden yellow eyes that do not move within the sockets. These birds can rotate their heads 180 degrees to see and hear what’s going on around them. Facial feather discs help direct soundwaves to their ears, allowing them to track their prey, and their wide wings enable them to fly deftly, with serrated primary feathers dispersing turbulence and softer feathers muffling sound.

Great Horned Owl Range & Migration Map

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