If you look closely at an owl’s eyes, you’ll notice the owl’s eye colors are different.
The color of an owl’s eyes tells a story about their lives.
An owl’s eye color helps us identify their species and indicates the time of day they predominantly hunt.
Although this isn’t always accurate with every owl species, as a birdwatcher, it helps pinpoint your best chances of seeing one.
Dark Brown or Black Owl’s Eyes
Owls with dark brown or black eyes are nocturnal, meaning they prefer to hunt at night.
The dark eye color doesn’t help the owls to see in the dark. It’s an evolutionary trait to help them to camouflage in the darkness.
There are many species of owls with dark eye colors, including the Northern Spotted Owl, Barred Owl, and Barn Owl.
You might have some of these owls in your back yard right now.
These owls can capture prey in total darkness with their incredible sense of hearing.
There’s a chance you might see one of these owls in daylight on a cloudy day, but these sightings are treasured moments.
Orange Owl’s Eyes
Owls with orange eyes are crepuscular, meaning they’re active during low light periods such as dusk and dawn.
Owls with orange eyes prefer hunting for their meal in the soft light of the early morning.
Species of owls with orange eyes include the Eurasian Eagle-owl.
READ: THE WISE OWL
Yellow Owl’s Eyes
Owls with yellow eyes are diurnal and prefer to hunt during the daytime.
Their habits are just like humans.
Owls with yellow eyes are active in the day and sleep at night.
Common owls with yellow eyes include Burrowing Owl, Great Gray Owl, Northern Saw-whet Owl, Short-earned Owl, Great Horned Owl and the Snowy Owl.
Their beauty is simply undeniable.
These owls have excellent eyesight but rely on their hearing to detect mice or other small rodents moving beneath the snow.
Then they swoop down and grab their prey with their talons.
Luck is When Preparation Meets Opportunity
Success at finding an owl often results from being in the right place at the right time.
It takes patience, persistence, preparation, and some luck.
But the chance of seeing a beautiful up-close is worth the effort.
Now get out and see some owls.
If you love owls, here are a few organizations you can support that advocate and protect these beautiful birds.
Support the Owl Research Institute. Read more about them here.
Support the Nature Conservancy who are working throughout the world to protect owls and owl habitat. Read more about them here.
All this matches up well, except for the Great Horned Owl, which tends to be
more crepuscular to nocturnal.
Hi Jeff. You are correct! Great Horned Owls are more crepuscular to nocturnal giving those of us who love to prowl for owls chances to see them at dusk and dawn. 🙂
yes, but are there owls that have pink eyes or blue or purple? do owls get in heat? do they mate and how do they mate?
This is an over-simplistic view of owls that will lead to misinformation.
Screech Owls, Saw-Whet Owls, Great Horned Owls, Great Gray Owls, Long-eared owls, just to name a few off the cuff, are all yellow-eyed owl species that are Nocturnal or Crepuscular.
While all Diurnal owls may have yellow eyes (I’m uncertain if that is confirmed true), not all yellow-eyed owls are diurnal. The distinction is subtle but important, similar to how, while all poodles are dogs, not all dogs are poodles.
While this article is posted with a caveat that the color isn’t accurate to all owls, the definitive wording of the subtitle misleads the reader into believing this is the rule or norm with a few exceptions, when that is not the case.
Thank you for clarifying, Winnifred. I was very confused reading this article since I have been to a Saw-whet Owl banding before, and they were captured after dusk. Don’t think I’ll be looking to this blog/website as a reputable source of information.
Many years ago, perhaps 7-8 yrs, in broad daylight/summer/3-4 pm, I saw something in my front yard, about 70 ft., away, where a tall Spruce tree was. As I looked, perhaps 3/4 of the way up the trunk, I noticed a large off-white object against it. There were various thick branches attached to the trunk making it difficult to see what it was. (I was looking out a window in my house.)
As I continued looking, there was a slight movement, a head which had been looking thru branches in the opposite direction, moved slowly in my direction (South) and I saw it was a very large owl. Not sure what kind of owl it was.
From the tree height, it could look throughout my large property in northern Connecticut and beyond to my neighbor’s cattle fields and further, still to the West. I watched for a long time, but had other things to do, so stopped watching.
Sometimes in the early (1 AM-ish) hours, I sometimes would hear a who-who-who coming from a tree beyond in my sheep pasture. If I listened intently, sometimes I would hear an answering who-who-who from much further away, in the neighbor’s cattle pastures.
I miss those infrequent calls as I moved to an assisted living facility in NJ over a year ago, so those sounds remain in my memory bank & occasionally they come to mind.