Giant Owls and Thunderbirds

I heard an interview on C2C about a year ago and the topic was Thunderbirds and Giant Owls. While I can't say that I've ever seen a Thunderbird, I can say that I've had an encounter with a Giant Owl.

My cousin and I were walking home from squirrel hunting one afternoon, I was about 10 or 11 years old, and saw what I thought was big stump. As I was walking around it it started walking towards me. I'd say it was 6' tall or so. I screamed like a little girl and jumped back. That's when I saw the eyes and beak. My cousin started running and I wasn't far behind. I stopped and saw that this thing was still following, oddly enough on the ground, and not in the air. I was carrying a .410 shotgun and shot at it. This deterred it enough for us to get away.

When we got home we told my dad and uncle about it and they went looking for it. When they got back they said they found it and that it was dead. My uncle was visibly shaken and my dad was, in his words " a little freaked". My uncle said it was the biggest damn bird he'd ever seen.

I was wondering if anyone has had similar experiences or could maybe shed some light on how an owl got to be so big.

Well, what then happened to the dead bird?

reply to post by cw0203



I worked construction the last couple months in Southern Iowa \ Northern Missouri. We were out in the middle of nowhere. I'm talking RURALareas.
My crew and I saw turkey buzzards that looked liked pterodactyls. They looked like they had 15' wingspans. We saw great horned owls that appeared 5 feet tall.

BUT...when you got close to these raptors, you would see that they had 4-5 foot wingspans. They were not as big as a car, although they certainly appeared to be. They looked HUGE from a distance.
We did see an owl that was unreal! I'm guessing a 7-foot wingspan.
That thing freaked me out.

I would love to see a 'thunderbird' with a 20 foot wingspan. I hope they're out there.

I found this picture somewhere, may have even been on this site, this critter looks pretty big:

It certainly looks like a possible candidate for a Mothman?



and I also found a splendid image online too. I would be pretty scared having this swoop out of the dark at me:



Genus