Super Bowl weekend ushers in buzz about halftime performances, high-budget commercials and of course, who will win the NFL's championship game. But year-round, Boise State's raptor biologists are honed in on a different topic: superb owls.

Boise State is home to the world's only Master of Science in Raptor Biology program. A raptor (derived from the Latin rapere, "to seize") is any bird of prey - carnivorous bird species that hunt and feed on other vertebrates. Bird biologists from far and wide flock to Boise State to conduct meaningful research on these predatory species. And owls just might be the cutest of the carnivores.

Curious about these superb birds? Take a pause from that game and read more about owl species, as told by Boise State biologists.

Owl fact 1: Burrowing Owls run after their prey

When you think of owls, you probably imagine them in trees, swooping down to catch prey in the dead of night. Not so for Burrowing Owls, according to raptor biology masters student Elizabeth Jessmore.

Burrowing Owls evolved long legs to chase after insects and small rodents. And though they tend to save hunting for darker times, like dusk and dawn, these owls aren't nocturnal.

"With bigger owl species, like a great gray, a great horned owl or a barred owl, typically they're in a tree, or they're flying," Jessmore said. "Burrowing owls are often on the ground, walking around, being cute and chasing prey on foot. They're also awake and active during daylight hours."

Owl fact 2: North America's largest population of nesting birds is right outside Boise

Jessmore studies owl population genetics in the Morley Nelson Snake River Birds of Prey National Conservation Area - NCA for short - 40 miles south of downtown Boise. The NCA harbors the highest nesting of raptors in the continent and possibly the world. About 800 pairs of hawks, eagles, falcons and owls raise their young in the area each spring.

Congress established the NCA on August 4, 1993, and it remains a bird haven today.

Owl fact 3: Humans can help owls thrive

Masters in raptor biology student Solai Le Fay studies burrowing owl populations in northern Oregon, focusing on nest productivity and adult survival. Her research site is a former chemical weapons depot. It may not sound like a place where birds would thrive, but Le Fay explained that human intervention helped revitalize the owl population there, from just a few pairs in 2009 to 103 breeding pairs and hundreds of chicks in 2024.

"[Burrowing owls] rely on other animals, like badgers, to dig burrows for them. But at this site, all of the badgers were wiped out, so the population [of owls] started to crash," Le Fay said. "They had nowhere to nest. So, people started installing all these artificial burrows underground, and the population completely rebounded."

Another result of human-designed burrows? Scientists know exactly where the birds are, and can conveniently band them in order to collect data.

"We get all of this really valuable re-capture data," Le Fay said, "like catching the same bird year after year and knowing it was born here, who its parents are, and its siblings and their babies."

For more

Want "owl" the facts on fascinating species? Listen to Elizabeth Jessmore's podcast, "Wild Things", which educates listeners about the natural world in Idaho.

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