Great Horned Owl - Adult and Owlet

I discovered an Owl nest back in the Spring that I kept an eye on for several weeks. The woods are pretty dense at that location so getting a shot of the adult on the nest was a bit of a challenge.

I'm not sure how many eggs the bird was incubating but it's been my experience that the birds in this area in past years have only raised a single chick. This year was no exception. Once the young bird left the nest I was only lucky enough to find it on a couple of occasions. The following shots are from the first encounter.

The adult birds were never far away.  Whenever I was in the area they were almost always aware of my presence before I was aware of theirs. It's not uncommon to hear them hooting back and forth, one bird having a lower pitched hoot than the other - one way to distinguish the sexes. I can't say which one is pictured here.