A Year with the Owl: teacher key

Great Horned Owls, grade 5 edition, written for 5th grade. Follow a great horned owl through its year: a territory, a borrowed nest, eggs that hatch in about a month, and young that can fly at about 9 to 10 weeks.

Read the book. Print this page for the key.

Questions and answers

1. How long do great horned owl eggs take to hatch?
   • About a day
   • About a month (answer)
   • About a year
2. How wide can a great horned owl's wingspan reach?
   • About 15 meters
   • About 15 centimeters
   • About 1.5 meters (5 feet) (answer)
3. What does the owl do with the bones and fur it cannot digest?
   • Coughs up pellets (answer)
   • Builds a nest
   • Swallows them again
4. When do young great horned owls climb out onto nearby branches?
   • At 1 week old
   • At about 5 to 6 weeks old (answer)
   • At 2 years old
5. What does a mated pair of great horned owls do all year?
   • Stay in their territory (answer)
   • Migrate far away
   • Live in a hawk's nest only
6. A great horned owl uses a nest that hawks built. What do we know about it?
   • It built that nest
   • It cannot lay eggs
   • It did not build that nest (answer)

Words

• sockets: eye holes
• perch: a high seat
• pellets: small lumps
• territory: claimed area
• down: soft feathers
• prey: hunted animals