Thieves Make Off With - What? - Owl Vomit

Not even birds want the stuff, but sneaky thieves are slipping into silos and bluffing their way into barns to pilfer an unusual booty: owl vomit.

Barn owls, after dining on a mouse, regurgitate a compact ball of fur and bone, the parts of the rodent they can’t digest.

Because it’s possible to reconstruct a mouse skeleton from owl “pellets,” the balls of waste are in demand as science-teaching tools.

Students find them neater and quicker to dissect than preserved frogs. They can tease apart the pellets and reassemble the bones, learning about birds, the food chain and bone structures.

The pellets can fetch $1.50 each on the retail market. And such easy pickings on the barn floor have produced a new class of scofflaw:

The regurgitation rustler.

Authorities in mostly rural Whatcom County say some pellet collectors have lied to farmers about working as researchers for Western Washington University in Bellingham or for the state to get into buildings where the owls nest.

“If you have a barn in Whatcom County that has an owl, you are a target for a pellet collector,” said Joe Bailey of Ferndale, Wash., a legitimate collector. “For every one who knocks on your door, three have been in there. If you don’t have a padlock on your door, they’ll get in there. They’ll lie to your face. They’ll do whatever they can to get in.”

Rian Vangelder’s farm northwest of Lynden, Wash., recently was hit by a pellet poacher.

“I don’t want to have strangers on my property,” Vangelder, 42, said. “Now, they are stealing only owl balls. What are they going to steal next? He did it so quick - five seconds and he was out of here.”

The unscrupulous few are spoiling it for everyone, legitimate collectors say.

“Farmers don’t want to deal with the hassle, so they say, ‘No one else is going to collect here,”’ said Dave Carter of Mount Vernon, Wash., who has been collecting pellets for 11 years. “And that hurts all collectors.”

Harm also can come to the owls, which require seclusion while raising their young.

Bill Brown, a farmer in Laurel, Wash., said about five collectors a year approach him, many falsely claiming to do research for the university.

“They’ll tell you why they should take the pellets for the good of humanity,” he said. “I used to toy with them, ask them questions. They don’t know a thing about barn owls.

“It’s just annoying more than anything else. And I don’t like the idea that people are rummaging around in my barn when I’m not around.”

Some farmers have asked authorities to intervene.