ECO-WARRIORS at Brookham School in Liphook are participating in the South Downs National Park Authority’s Barn Owl Box (BOB) project and they now have two barn owl boxes in their school grounds.
Project BOB began two years ago when severe weather and a lack of prey caused many adult barn owls to perish and few pairs were able to breed.
Since then rangers, ecologists and farmers have been collecting information on existing barn owl boxes across the South Downs National Park and finding suitable sites to install more barn owl boxes.
Brookham School, which has an Eco-Schools Green Flag Award, is now part of this.
During a visit to Brookham School, Jonathan Dean and Angela Ward from the South Downs National Park Authority discussed with the children the importance of wildlife, particularly owls, and looked at their habitat, survival features and diet.
The children then investigated regurgitated owl pellets using magnifying glasses and tweezers and compared the remains against information maps provided to work out which animal had been the owl’s latest meal.
The group explored Highfield and Brookham’s extensive grounds and used special owl view finders to look for areas with large trees, long grass and hedgerows which would be perfect for barn owl boxes.
Two locations were identified and barn owl boxes were then subsequently installed over half term last?October.
These barn owl boxes will be monitored over the forthcoming months and it is hoped that by the spring, some barn owls will have taken up residence.