Superbowl

Soooo, this is a very complex question, but we can look at a few things.

We'll start with one of the easiest aspects. Part of our fascination with owls is their ability to blend into nature, so many of the photos we get are going to be selected to highlight this thing which is amazing to us. If you go back through all the owl pics here, there are absolutely some, where even when cropped in tightly, are still pretty invisible. Others are fairly distant, and you can still see them well. Especially when moving, camouflage loses much of its effectiveness. That is why owls spend most of their day motionless, just sitting and observing.

Now, does an owl have awareness of its camouflage? Owls have been around for 60 million years. They are almost everywhere in the world and have become successful in almost any ecosystem. If you pick any random owl, you're most likely going to find a brown or grey as a main color. Even of you didn't add any patterning, it's still a very good start to blend in to a backdrop of trees. Over many generations, we're going to be left with owls who are born with a sense of what works. Blending in with your background is called crypsis, or cryptic camouflage. It's something done by countless animals. For the owls, even when they don't blend in perfectly, they are still not very noticeable. They are generally up above their prey, and probably hear most prey before it has a chance to see them. It doesn't need to be perfectly invisible all the time, just long enough to get it time to get the jump on their target.

These images have them standing out pretty well, but the owls have also been pointed out to us by the photographer, they are still reasonably hidden, and we aren't a tiny rodent crawling much lower, and we're examining it with human intelligence. The only thing that will likely give this owl away to the prey is movement when it takes off.

Birds have a bit more intelligence than some other organisms of course, and there is evidence that owls have some sense of self awareness of their camouflage. Owls will contort their body and feathers to elongate and slim down to better mimic a tree branch when they wish to hide. They also seem to know their eyes are noticeable and will shut their eyes to become even more hidden. Here is a pic of Flammy from the other week showing what a difference closed eyes can make.

Owls will get much feedback from their camouflage ability. As a predator, they will learn what works or what doesn't, and I'm sure by now much of that is in their genes. They also need to stay hidden during the day to avoid attacks by other animals that don't want them around so they will learn what places they get bothered less.

I'm disappointed I haven't seen any studies specifically on this, but I will keep my eyes out for any. The things I've mentioned seem to be a combination of thoughts that I could find. I did see some neat thing about how some Japanese quails learn if they lay eggs with darker or lighter spots and will then make future nests in lighter or darker locations to help them blend in more, so there are many cool tricks bird have to be invisible. How much is genetic/mimicry/learned still seems to be up for debate, but it is all fascinating.