@[email protected] is singlehandedly keeping this place alive so I thought I’d also participate and share a photo I took last month. This is a burrowing owl I photographed on the grounds of a hotel in Brasilia. A couple of these guys made their burrow in a little hole hill at the bottom of the garden and were seemingly unbothered by hotel guests that were walking past. I have a couple of other shots but this is my favourite. Thanks for all your superb owl posts anon6789!
I’ve seen them called “Howdy Owls” due to their apparent curiosity when people come by. They like to check out who’s by the burrow.
I only got to see one captive one, and it most definitely was not giving me a friendly face. 😅
A quick look made it sound like the area you were in was a bit different than OP, so if you didn’t see I posted a subspecies guide to ID what variety of Burrow Owl you saw, give that a look. Yours looks less brownish than theirs.
Interesting! Reading through them I wonder if mine was A. c. cunicularia
I think that is a good candidate for sure. Can’t see the spotting or barring too well, but the back (dorsum) spots and especially the belly (ventrum) are very white. Pantanal looks to be right in line between Bolivia and the state of Rio Grande do Sul.
A. c. juninensis is maybe possible, especially if that belly is all white, but that seems to be a bit west of the Pantanal area.
Found this page which has a photo or 2 of each subspecies.
This was really fun for me, I’ve never dived down into investigating subspecies before this, and it’s cool to see how different they can be from each other. This is why I love you guys sharing stuff as it gets me to think about things that haven’t gotten on my radar!