Mystery of the Barking Dog

Every morning as Bill (his real name) walked to his commuter train he heard a barking dog. It was always in the same spot, deep in a wooded patch not far from his house. Only this dog barked unlike any he had heard. And it was so regular you could almost set your watch by it. There were times when he heard it in the evenings, around dusk. He determined it was some sort of time or motion activated mechanical device the homeowner used to frighten off deer, or burglars, since they do about equal damage.
Then the other evening he and his wife, Kate (also her real name) went for a walk. Right on schedule the dog started barking, thus proving to his wife that while he might occasionally hear voices in his head, barking dogs were for real.
Kate quickly analyzed the situation and noted that it was an owl hooting, not a dog barking.
These folks do not consider themselves birders. (They’re hooked, they just don’t know it yet.) They are computer savvy so when they got home they did the modern-birder thing and headed straight for the information highway. That’s where I come into this scene. Bill (a real co-worker) told me (office resident all-things-nature-guy) about a great Web site he found, www.owlpages.com, where you not only see great photos of virtually every owl species, you can click on a button and listen to the vocalizations, often the key identifier when determining which owl is hooooo.