**Acknowledgements and photo credits**

I would like to thank David H. Johnson for allowing me to include the total feather count he and a small group of volunteers painstakingly removed from the remains of a Great Horned Owl (*B. virginianus*) in 2017 before his own publication on the subject and thank Bruce Marcot and Heimo Mikkola for their helpful editorial comments and valuable input. I would also like to thank the following individuals for their kind permission for the use of their photos and images: Deane Lewis (**Figure 2**), Bruce Marcot (**Figure 4**), Jari Peltomäki (**Figure 15**) and Roar Solheim (**Figure 16**).

*Owls - Clever Survivors*
