Newspaper Article

An Owl May Be Wise, But Sociable It Is Not

Keith Henderson. Keith Henderson is a Monitor editorial writer

1996

Overview

Stripey the great horned owl should take his - oops, make that \"her\" - place among literature's memorable animal protagonists. Not that Max Terman's account of an intimate relationship with one of nature's less sociable creatures is a \"story,\" in the fictional sense. This is a meticulously recorded scientific observation. But it's one appealingly interwoven with emotion and sentiment. In a word, it's readable, for ornithologist and layman alike. The saga begins with the discovery near the Hillsboro, Kan., campus of Tabor College - where Terman teaches - of a deserted and starving owl chick. Terman, an ecologist with a heart and a curiosity as wide as the surrounding prairie, decides to adopt the orphan. Thus starts an experiment in understanding the life choices of an \"imprinted\" wild animal - that is, one so marked by human contact that a normal life in the woods and fields may be out of the question.

• Publisher: The Christian Science Publishing Society (d/b/a \"The Christian Science Monitor\"), trusteeship under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts