The day I learnt owls aren’ twise after all

DEXTER is a bird with attitude. A great horned owl with a furious expression, he hops from leg to leg on his perch, like Andy Murray awaiting a serve.

‘That means you’ve got his attention,’ says Jamie, the falconer. I stand 100 yards away and Dexter glides low, sleek as a fighter jet, landing delicately on my extended arm. Jamie rewards him with the day-old head of a cockerel, which he gulps down, whole.

‘His feet can exert a quarter ton of pressure,’ says Jamie. ‘That’s how he kills his prey. The beak is only used for tearing flesh.’ Oh, good. I am in Bedfordshire at the Bird Of Prey Centre, home to 280 birds, including eagles, falcons, hawks and owls, which the public can handle and watch in displays.

My interest is owls, and I am spending the day with their 30-odd species of owl.

‘Feed them too much,’ says Jamie, ‘and they won’t have the incentive to train.’

Owls are naturally lazy: they spend 90 per cent of their time sitting, and fly only when they want to eat. Next to fly is Malley, a great grey owl, one of the tallest species. Then comes Humpty, a huge, comical Eurasian eagle owl. They look eminently huggable beneath those feathers. I hear them squawk for food, cluck in warning, hoot for sex.

But then comes a shocking revelation. ‘ Owls are rather stupid,’ says Jamie. ‘Their eyes take up 70 per cent of their skull. There’s little room left for a brain.’

This, I refuse to believe. Because, as we all know, owls are wise.

TRAVEL FACTS

AN OWL and eagle experience costs £42, birdsofpreycentre.co.uk, 01234 742362.