Hurrying to pick up a pizza before the football, a driver pulled up at a stop sign and noticed something odd above him.
Initially, Sydney resident Matt Arnold thought there was a dead branch dangling from the power lines above.
Then he noticed the object was wild, alive, and creating a “strange noise”.
What he’d spotted was an unusual three-way tussle between a prey species, a predator, and humankind.
“The [ringtail possum’s] tail was what actually caught my attention first, as it was what was more illuminated by the street lights and made me stop and pull over,” he told Yahoo News.
Getting out of his car, the second thing Matt noticed was that the possum wasn’t caught on the powerlines themselves.
It was gripped in the talons of a powerful owl, a giant bird of prey with a wingspan of up to 1.4 metres.
The third thing he observed was that the owl’s wing was tanlged in the wires overhead.
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Although it was entangled in power lines, the owl didn’t want to give up its meal.
(Matt Arnold)
“The owl didn’t appear stressed — it just seemed to be looking around, wondering how it could get out of its situation,” Matt said.
“It wasn’t trying to struggle, but I noticed it was looking down at me as I walked around underneath, taking the photos, and trying to work out how or if I could help somehow.”
“There was a very faint noise coming from above me, but it was hard to tell whether it was the owl itself or the possum taking its last few breaths.”
A powerful owl stares back at the camera, while caught on power lines, with a possum in its talons.
Theories behind owl and possum hanging from wires
The situation unfolded in the leafy suburb of Yarrawarrah, in Sydney’s far south.
Surrounded by bushland, it’s a place where wildlife and humankind often collide.
Birdlife Australia’s Dr Holly Parsons is a specialist in powerful owls living in urban environments, and she’s aware of the birds being killed when they collide with power lines.
Two powerful owls in a tree in NSW.
“It’s probable that the birds were hunting the ringtails, which often walk along powerlines, and in the struggle, have slipped,” she told Yahoo News.
She believes the owl in the Yarrawarrah photo could have been entangled in the wire, but there’s a second reason it could have been hanging.
Another species, the rufous owl, has been observed clinging to wires by hooking its wing around wires in the Northern Territory.
While this is dangerous behaviour because of the risk of electrocution, she said what it does highlight is “just how adaptable these birds are, their ability to navigate and exploit urban environments is genuinely remarkable”.
“But it’s worth keeping that in perspective, because it is really hard for them out there.
“Powerful owls are a threatened species (vulnerable in NSW), and they face a whole host of pressures in the urban landscape.”
Powerlines are killers of Australia’s owls
For 15 minutes, Matt stood on the side of the road, calling a volunteer rescue service for advice.
But as he waited on hold, the owl took flight, with the possum still in its clutches.
Many of Australia’s larger predators can struggle to navigate around powerlines.
In Tasmania, wedge-tailed eagles are frequently killed during collisions with wires.
In hotspots, electricity providers can easily mitigate the problem by adding colourful, plastic flappers to wires. Although this rarely occurs.
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Dr Parsons notes that while power lines are a problem, they’re far from being the biggest issue facing powerful owls.
“The loss of hollow-bearing trees is the big one, and the clearing of bushland that they need for hunting and to support their prey,” she said.
“So any time you mitigate risks, it’s great, but when it comes to powerful owls, there are a lot of them.”
Other problems the species faces are car strikes and poisoning from rodenticides sold at supermarkets and hardware stores, particularly second-generation anticoagulant rodenticides (SGARs).
“It’s genuinely exciting that powerful owls can make a life in our cities,” she said.
“But they remain in a precarious position, and the urban environment, for all its opportunities, adds risks that compound the pressures they already face.”
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