4 Weeks Old and Already Ferocious
From [The Raptor Center ](https://www.facebook.com/100064810265344/posts/1399208898916106/)
> This fierce-looking young raptor is a baby great horned owl displaying its natural defensive behaviors when sensing a potential threat. These photos were taken upon this 4-week-old chick's admission to TRC's raptor hospital on March 29 after falling from its nest. The owlet's puffed feathers and fanned-out tail are meant to make this baby look big and intimidating. A young owl in a defensive pose like this will also be snapping its beak together to make a "clacking" sound. That and the intense stare are warning signs designed to tell predators "Stay away!"
>
> These feisty behaviors are healthy ones we like to see. While young patients remain in care at TRC's raptor hospital, we follow practices to ensure they don't habituate to or imprint on people. In wildlife, habituation occurs most readily in young animals when they get accustomed to human presence and lose their natural fear. Imprinting refers to the formation of an animal's self-identity, typically through bonding with its parents, who provide food and care. It is important to prevent young patients from associating humans with parental roles. This would render them unfit to survive in the wild, as they would rely on humans rather than their own species to develop essential survival skills and would not properly interact with members of their own species.
>
> Some of the ways we minimize their bonding with us are: feeding birds in the dark with sound machines so they don't associate humans with food, wearing camouflage ghillie suits while feeding babies, encouraging them to self-feed as soon as possible, refraining from talking in baby areas so they don't become used to human voices, and otherwise minimizing interactions with us.
>
> So when our raptor patients make it clear they'd rather not be in our company, we're glad, as it's an encouraging sign in their journey to be released back to the wild.
>
> After being medically cleared, this young owl, patient 25-0131, was successfully returned to the nest and its awaiting parents the following day.
> This fierce-looking young raptor is a baby great horned owl displaying its natural defensive behaviors when sensing a potential threat. These photos were taken upon this 4-week-old chick's admission to TRC's raptor hospital on March 29 after falling from its nest. The owlet's puffed feathers and fanned-out tail are meant to make this baby look big and intimidating. A young owl in a defensive pose like this will also be snapping its beak together to make a "clacking" sound. That and the intense stare are warning signs designed to tell predators "Stay away!"
>
> These feisty behaviors are healthy ones we like to see. While young patients remain in care at TRC's raptor hospital, we follow practices to ensure they don't habituate to or imprint on people. In wildlife, habituation occurs most readily in young animals when they get accustomed to human presence and lose their natural fear. Imprinting refers to the formation of an animal's self-identity, typically through bonding with its parents, who provide food and care. It is important to prevent young patients from associating humans with parental roles. This would render them unfit to survive in the wild, as they would rely on humans rather than their own species to develop essential survival skills and would not properly interact with members of their own species.
>
> Some of the ways we minimize their bonding with us are: feeding birds in the dark with sound machines so they don't associate humans with food, wearing camouflage ghillie suits while feeding babies, encouraging them to self-feed as soon as possible, refraining from talking in baby areas so they don't become used to human voices, and otherwise minimizing interactions with us.
>
> So when our raptor patients make it clear they'd rather not be in our company, we're glad, as it's an encouraging sign in their journey to be released back to the wild.
>
> After being medically cleared, this young owl, patient 25-0131, was successfully returned to the nest and its awaiting parents the following day.