My daughter has been really into owls lately because she is reading "The Guardians of Ga'hoole" series of books. We actually did a short unit on owls a month or so ago. But, we never got around to doing the owl pellets experiment. So, yesterday we took out the pellets (there were 3 in the pack I ordered) and all the supplies and went to work. C didn't want to do it at first, but once he got into it he liked it. He didn't make it through the whole dissection - he got through half of it and got bored. I finished his pellet. He did really well for an 8 year old. L got through the dissection, but put the bones in a bag that she will sort out later.
A little background: Owls eat their food whole and digest it in their stomachs and the rest of the GI tract. What can't be broken down in the stomach (hair, fur, bones, etc.) is stored in the gizzard and later regurgitated as a pellet. I got pellets from a scientific supply store so that they had been disinfected. We dissected them with forceps.
Both kids really enjoyed doing this. L did it as part of her science fair project, so she still needs to organize the bones and try to figure out what the owl had eaten. It was really a pretty fun project.
A little background: Owls eat their food whole and digest it in their stomachs and the rest of the GI tract. What can't be broken down in the stomach (hair, fur, bones, etc.) is stored in the gizzard and later regurgitated as a pellet. I got pellets from a scientific supply store so that they had been disinfected. We dissected them with forceps.
Both kids really enjoyed doing this. L did it as part of her science fair project, so she still needs to organize the bones and try to figure out what the owl had eaten. It was really a pretty fun project.
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