The International Festival of Owls originally started as a
"hatch-day" party for Alice the Great Horned
Owl in 2003. Alice is a permanently injured,
human-imprinted owl who works at the Houston Nature Center.
Since she's the only live animal at the center and she lives at
the home of her handler, she quickly became the center of
attention. The "hatch-day" party idea served several
purposes:
- Taught people about owls
- Provided a fun, family-friendly activity at the end of
winter
- Raised money for the Houston Nature Center
- Promoted tourism during an otherwise slow time of year
The first festival was a wonderful success, even with little
advertising. It turns out that no one else was doing
anything like it in North America. The only thing close
was a one day Burrowing Owl Festival in Cape Coral, Florida.
Our festival rapidly grew into the only full-weekend, all-owl
festival in North America (and perhaps the world...other than a
festival that started in Italy based on our festival.)
People started coming from all over North America to attend.
Then we created the
World Owl Hall of
Fame to bring recognition to owls and humans doing amazing
things to make this world a better place for owls. This
brings award winners from all over the world to Houston, and gets equally widespread media
coverage.
The 2008 festival attracted approximately 500 people (which
is pretty good considering that Houston isn't exactly close to
any major population centers!)
Festival attendees have come from Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa,
South Dakota, Michigan, Ohio, Illinois, Texas, New York,
California, Virginia, Georgia, Oregon, Montana, Manitoba,
Saskatchewan, Ontario, Jamaica, England, and The Netherlands,
among other places.
The International Festival of Owls is held annually the first
weekend in March, which is about when Alice the Great Horned Owl
hatched in Antigo, Wisconsin. It takes place throughout
Houston, with events at two churches, the public library, high
school, nature center, and community center; all restaurants
have owl themed-food and antique shops feature their owl items.
website hosted by The Owl Pages
