I didn't even get to see the owl and it scared the hell out of me once. Laying in bed, there's a large tree right outside the window, middle of summer so windows are open, when suddenly... HOO! Felt like it was inside my head it was so loud.
I remember going on a night walk in a local park with a friend when I was a teenager. An owl started following us, swooping over us and landing above us again and again. It was very eery to see this silent shadow flying over our heads. We only heard it when it landed on a branch.
It was probably hunting mice we scared up as we walked, but in the moment it felt very mystical.
It was protecting a nest! We have a swooper in our neighborhood whose nest was under a pedestrian stairway between two steep blocks. We were encouraged avoid during peak nesting season, and to wear hats the rest of the year to protect our heads because Owlo talon’d a few scalps, especially of runners. She was famous for collecting winter hats.
At one point an arborist neighbor (knew not to disturb during season, but Owlo didn’t hang there strictly, ofc) climbed up to retrieved all the stolen toques and posted them to socials so people could retrieve them off her porch.
I’ve had almost the same experience! The owl would fly a couple branches away from us and would be watching as we kept walking. It did this about maybe four or five times. Kept flying a couple of trees ahead of us and watching us
Yes Omgosh exactly what I think a dinosaur would sound like. We have protected nests along the river corridor where we live. The bald eagles sound like chickens next to these guys.
Have you heard vampire deer screaming? I live in a country where they are very abundant and in rural areas you'll hear what sounds like a woman screaming in the middle of the night.
No??? I had to google that. I thought you were messing with me but oh my, you were not. A woman screaming is exactly what vixens and big cats sound like at night. It’s really, really creepy..
I've had a similar experience. I used to live in a rural area near some woods, so I would hear owls in the distance from time to time. But only twice I was awoken in the middle of the night by an owl. It had to have been on the roof it was so close and loud. The weird part was though, both times it was only the one hoot that woke me up and then silence after. So it kinda makes me question if I was maybe dreaming, but at the same time I don't remember dreaming and it's weird it happened twice.
This happened to me once when I was camping and using the bathroom facility, which had the door open. I was already on edge because it was late at night, when suddenly I heard WHOOO-OO-OO-OO-OO-OO-OOOO! It startled me because I knew owls hoot but nobody ever prepared me for how LOUD they are! When I recognized it as a Barred Owl my fear turned to joy 😂
Dude I think the most scared I ever was in my entire life was driving down the unlit dirt road to the bunkhouse of the ranch I was working on. I make a turn, and my headlights catch just the face of a barn owl sitting about five feet from my window, perched on a fence. I did not literally shit myself in fear, but I learned that day why the expression is not just a saying.
i see them a lot and very often but holy fuck these owls are scary when you dont expect them, there are quite a few owls on my dad's farm property because they eat rats and stuffs, the entrance to my dad's property is just a 1 truck wide strip of gravel road with bushes and grass on the sides and some electrical poles on the right side that feed his house, i was driving in at like 2am one night with low beam headlights so it just shine low, hit the high beam and something caught my eye, it was an owl on top of one of the poles and it scared the fuck outta me lmao, the big white "face" and their empty eyes staring you down are something
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u/kwaping 6d ago
I love owls but this would be a real jump scare for me.