Owls are birds. Most owls are awake and hunt at night. Most owls live alone. Owls live on every continent except Antarctica. An owl's feather colors help it blend in with its surroundings. Let's find out how owls live and hunt in the dark.

Owls have big eyes. But they cannot move their eyes around. Instead, they turn their whole heads. An owl can turn its head far around to look behind it. An owl's ears are holes in its head, hidden under feathers. An owl can hear a mouse step on a twig from about 75 feet (23 meters) away.

Many owls fly almost without a sound. Owls catch small animals such as mice to eat. They grab their food with sharp claws called talons. A snowy owl's favorite food is lemmings.

Most owls do not build their own nests. They use old nests of other birds or holes in trees. Female owls are usually bigger than male owls. A father owl brings food to the mother and the chicks. Burrowing owls are active in the daytime.

Snowy owls spend the summer on the cold, treeless tundra of the far north. Owls cough up pellets of fur and bones that they cannot digest. Owls help people by eating rodents such as mice and rats.

Words to know

• talons: sharp claws
• pellets: fur-and-bone balls
• lemmings: tiny tundra animals
• tundra: treeless land
• rodents: mice and rats