It's flying time for trio of owls

They grow up so fast.

One week they're helpless little creatures, depending on you for everything; the next, they're moving out.

For the screech owl, the elapsed time for this process is apparently less than 12 weeks.

On Monday, The Center for Birds of Prey released a trio of young screech owls into the wilds of a 3,000-acre Awendaw conservation easement. All three immediately soared into the forest — no tearful goodbye, no looking back, no "Born Free" moment.

Kids.

What's most amazing about these birds taking flight is the road they've traveled.

In late March, a line crew for SCE&G was working in Barnwell when they found these eggs inside a utility pole that had been partially hollowed out (probably by woodpeckers).

Trish Freshwater, public affairs coordinator for SCE&G, said the workers didn't know what kind of eggs they were, but did everything to protect them. They wrapped the eggs in a blanket and one man took them home and kept them warm.

Officials with the utility company tried to find a local home for the birds, but there was no place around to help them. So they turned to Jim Elliott, executive director of the Birds of Prey center in Awendaw. They know him well.

"We find a lot of birds in and around our infrastructure," Freshwater said. "SCE&G is very proud of its environmental commitments."

The Center for Birds of Prey put the eggs into an incubator around April 1. They hatched, one a day, on April 15, 16 and 17.

After that, the chicks were turned over to foster parents —a pair of screech owls at the center. They raised the kids for six or eight weeks, then Elliott's staff put the young owls into a cage with live food to see if they could learn to catch their own food.

They quickly found those owls can hunt.

This is old hat for Elliott and the center. They take in 400 or so abandoned or injured raptors a year, releasing the ones that can fend for themselves and caring for the rest. Monday was a success story, one that Elliott has seen many times. But even he didn't know exactly how the owls would react to their first taste of real freedom.

Apparently they liked it. The owls — scowling like rebellious teenagers — flew into the forest, disappearing within seconds, their brown and gray feathers providing a natural — and effective — camouflage.

From here, Elliott said, nature takes over. Screech owls, which are only 8 inches tall fully grown, are indigenous to the Lowcountry and don't migrate; they're here year-round.

"They were doing well. It was time to release them," Elliott said. "They will establish a territory in here somewhere."

And before long they'll have their own babies to worry about.

Reach Brian Hicks at 937-5561 or bhicks@postandcourier.com.