The Impact of Barn Owls on The Environments They Live in

The reason for the research into Barn Owl pellets is because we did not know much about them, and we wanted to learn more. The amount of research already out there was pretty good, but there could be more. One piece of information I could not find as easily as some of the other stuff was how much Barn Owls impact the environments that they live in. The research we now have makes it easier to know the impact Barn Owls have on the ecosystems they live in.

Some of the methods we used to learn more about Barn Owls were finding out information from other websites, or reading and finding out the information for ourselves if it wasn't available online. The methods we used to find the bones in the owl pellet, and to reassemble a skeleton were to first get tweezers, a poker thing, and a magnifying glass that helped us find bones and break into the owl pellet, then fter that we started separating the bones into a couple different piles based on their size. After we had the bones in separate piles, and we had gotten the fur off of them and thrown away all of the fur we started finding all of the bones that belonged to a rodent and from there we were able to ressamble a rodent skeleton, and then glue it down and label it on the sheet. The result of our research was that Barn Owls have a huge impact on their environments. In fact, they have even caused some species to become endangered, like the amargosa vole. Because Barn Owls can eat around fifteen hundred rodents a year, they need around thirty-four to one hundred sixteen acres of space depending on how good the land is to hunt and live in, and them eating so many rodents is useful for the surrounding area, because it will reduce the amount of crops that get destroyed by the rodents eating them.

In the results we found out just how big of an impact Barn Owls have on their ecosystem as the apex predator, and the populations of other animals in those ecosystems that are below them on trophic levels, this could be because one adult owl will eat around fifteen hundred rodents and other small creatures a year, which can severely reduce the populations of those species. The information available about Barn Owls is limited, and further research would be helpful for others to understand Barn Owls. A few pieces of information that we realized were not available or weren't as easily found were the human impacts on Barn Owls, and how humans are helping or hurting them. The information around how Barn Owls affect the ecology, habitats, and biomes in Nebraska, and how they live here was missing some important parts, and very few sources had information on the niche of Barn Owls. Another piece of information we could not find that would be very beneficial in the future to people wanting to learn about Barn Owls would be what the predator prey relationship of Barn Owls, and some of the other animals that they rely on for food. One other thing i noticed that would be nice to have more information for people wanting to learn more about Barn Owls would be information on owlets, or baby owls. More information on owlets would also help people understand how Barn Owls raise their young, and how long they take care of them, which could be helpful to know if you are interested in Barn Owls. We were able to find some very good information already out there on Barn Owls though, like examples of food webs and chains for Barn Owls and the other animals they eat. For future research, focusing on finding out more on Barn Owls, and their habitat, niche, or they ways they survive in specific areas, would be some of the most helpful to know. Because we were not able to find out some of the information we may have needed to improve the results of our study, further looking into the effects Barn Owls have on their ecosystems could prove to be very beneficial to helping preserve Barn Owls, and the ecosystems in which they live.

In conclusion, Barn Owls are very impactful to their environments, and they have caused some species to become endangered. They also are useful though because they control the number of rodents in an area.