Girl Mistakes Live Owl Nestled in Christmas Tree for Decoration: 'Mama, That Ornament Scared Me'
An Eastern screech owl is back in the wild after spending a good deal of the holiday season living in a Georgia family’s Christmas tree.
Katie McBride Newman enjoys owls and has a smattering of owl ornaments that she placed on her Christmas tree this season.
So when Newman’s 10-year-old daughter came to her in tears saying she had been spooked by an owl, Newman naturally assumed the girl was just frightened by an ornament.
Newman told CNN that in the evening of Dec. 10, she and her two children, India and Jack, had just finished dinner. India was clearing off the table when she made a loud gasp, followed by an emotional bout of tears.
A Georgia family got a special holiday surprise last week after finding an owl hiding inside their Christmas tree https://t.co/wc5eCY2ku7
— CNN (@CNN) December 19, 2019
“Oh my gosh!” Newman heard India exclaim from the other room.
“She comes very dramatically into the dining room and goes, ‘Mama, that ornament scared me,'” Newman told CNN. “Then she bursts into tears.”
Newman went over to the tree to investigate and watched as a small, feathery head turned and looked straight into her eyes.
“And I’m like, ‘Oh, that’s a real owl,'” Newman said.
India, meanwhile, bolted out of the room while Newman and her husband decided to open the windows and doors to the home, hoping to coax the owl back outdoors.
But the next morning, the owl was still perched in their Christmas tree.
Newman’s husband, Billy, told CNN they had bought the tree about two days after Thanksgiving, so it is possible the owl had been living in the tree the entire time, unnoticed.
The couple called the Chattahoochee Nature Center to report the owl, and left the bird some raw chicken, per the center’s instructions.
Saturday morning, an employee from the center arrived at the Newman home and was able to catch the owl.
Jon Copsey, a spokesperson for the nature center, told CNN that employee identified the bird as an Eastern screech owl, which is common in the Georgia area.
The employee checked the owl for injuries and observed that it was quite thin, suggesting it had been living indoors for a while.
She gave it some food and nutritional supplements and left the Newman family with instructions to safely release the bird back into the wild at nightfall.
The family left the bird in a crate in a dark room and then moved the crate outdoors at nightfall, leaving the door open. By 9:30 p.m. on Saturday night, the owl had vanished.
The Chattahoochee Nature Center told CNN the Newman family handled the situation very well by contacting wildlife experts and helping the bird to escape on its own.
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