Manhattan's Upper West Side has been reveling in the company of its latest celebrities: A family of barn owls nested in a water tower atop a building near Central Park.
This is the first documented instance of barn owls nesting in Manhattan in modern history, according to one expert, and the owls have attracted nightly crowds of people in the street eager to get a glimpse of the elusive birds.
"It was, like, totally shocking,” Andrew Farnsworth, a migration ecologist at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, said of the barn owls. "To the best of our knowledge, like the collective birding knowledge, there hasn’t been a nest in, you know, in Manhattan, at least in recorded history.”
Word of the barn owl family didn't get around until last week, when Elisabeth Williams, an Upper West Side resident, notified a local news outlet on Oct. 6 that she and her husband saw multiple owls at the water tower atop a building on West 75th Street close to Central Park West.
The couple had previously seen a single owl on an apartment windowsill a few days earlier and were shocked even then, Williams recalled.
"In a place like Manhattan, you normally really have to go out of your way to encounter nature,” she said. "And here it was, just sort of right outside our window.”
It's not the first time that birds have captivated New Yorkers. Residents have fallen in love with American woodcocks, who are known to stop in Midtown Manhattan’s Bryant Park every year as they migrate north in early spring. After Flaco the Eurasian eagle-owl died in 2024, dozens of mournful fans gathered to say goodbye to the beloved creature who flew around Manhattan and became a joy to many after someone let him out of his zoo enclosure the previous year. Then there was Pale Male, a red-tailed hawk who nested above Fifth Avenue for three decades before dying in 2023.
But barn owl sightings in New York City parks are very rare, according to the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation. New York is at the northern fringe of the barn owl's range and the barn owl population has declined "at an alarming rate” over time, according to the state Department of Environmental Conservation.
"There’s lots of excitement among New Yorkers, both birders and non-birders alike, about these owls because owls really capture the attention,” said Jessica Wilson, executive director of NYC Bird Alliance. "They’re magical, they’re nocturnal, they are secretive, they’re not commonly seen, especially on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. And to have this chance to see these birds is really thrilling.”
Photographers and casual onlookers have gathered on the street on a nightly basis to spot the owls.
"I’ve only seen one barn owl ever, and that was in California,” said Val Coleman, a retired New York City resident who was on the Upper West Side earlier this week trying to spot the owls. "At dusk, we hope they will come out to hunt. We hope they don’t eat poisoned rats with rodenticide in ’em.”
David Barrett, a Manhattan-based birder who runs the popular social media account, Manhattan Bird Alert, said he’s observed at least one adult barn owl and five fledglings at the water tower. He’s also seen an adult owl carrying rodents back to the water tower. There are believed to be two adult owls, and some photographers have claimed to have seen six fledglings, Barrett added.
"Having one barn owl is a rarity, but it’s not national news. Having a family, for the first time ever, breeding in Manhattan in recorded history, that’s special news,” Barrett said.
Before the recent barn owl sightings, Williams and her husband heard periodic screeching noises outside going back to early September. They initially assumed it was a bird of some kind but were skeptical when a phone app indicated the noise was from a barn owl.
Thomas Obersteiner said that he first heard bizarre screeching and wailing noises from outside one evening in mid-September. It sounded like someone was "being murdered outside,” he said.
"That lasted for two or three weeks, every night, sometimes more, sometimes less, coming from different directions,” Obersteiner added. "But I had no idea what that was.”
On multiple occasions, Obersteiner or his wife ran into their children's bedroom after mistaking the owls' screech for a child in pain, he said. It wasn't until he saw a news report that he realized that owls were making the sounds.
Farnsworth said the screech is typical of barn owls, who use it to communicate with one another. The screech is like a "horror movie kind of experience,” he said.
Obersteiner, who said his roof deck is "probably the best location in town right now” to watch the owls, has been letting nature photographers access that perch to observe the owls "almost every night” since news of the barn owls spread. On one night last week, 20 people had gathered.
"We can’t say no because it’s so much fun and these people are so serious,” Obersteiner added. "It's beautiful.”
Williams and her husband were not bird watchers before the barn owl family moved in to the water tower. But that may change soon after their "delightful” experience.
"I think we’re about to become birders,” Williams said.