Always the early risers, Robin Melnyk and his daughter Linnae, 6, like to go for walks in their Bella Vista neighbourhood in Vernon and search for owls.
The pair decided to build a great horned owl’s nest in their backyard tree and were rewarded for their effort in February when a mating couple moved in.
The female laid her eggs and the owlets have hatched, and are almost big enough to see over the top of the nest. The Melnyks have a perfect view from their second-storey window.
“We’re pretty thrilled,” said Melnyk. “In the next couple of weeks, the owlets will step out on the branches and will be clear to see walking around on the branches for about two weeks before they fly.
“It’s also great for our neighbours. They get to see the show.”
The Melnyks love their adventures.
On a spring break vacation to Hornby Island in 2017, Robin and Linnae wrote a message, put it in a bottle and set it off into the ocean. The message read “if you find this, please respond (had e-mail address and phone number attached) and re-launch the bottle.”
“A lady in Courtenay contacted us four days after we got home from the trip,” said Melnyk. “She put the message and bottle back into the ocean. We then got a call from a man saying he found the bottle at San Josef Bay, on the northwest tip of Vancouver Island. He found it under a log in the sand. He re-launched the bottle, too.”
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