This tiny owl was spotted lying in a ditch near Saxmundham, England. The passerby who spotted her assumed that she was injured, and when she didn’t fly away, it would seem that the assumption was correct. But apparently, that didn’t seem to be the case; there was something else keeping her on the ground.
The Good Samaritan called the Suffolk Owl Sanctuary for help. During an examination, staffers were shocked when they placed the little owl on a scale and discovered that she was roughly a third heavier than they expected.
The owl weighed a little over half a pound — healthy adult little owls tend to weigh closer to a third of a pound.
“We found her to simply be extremely obese!” Suffolk Owl Sanctuary wrote on Facebook.
The owl, which was aptly nicknamed Plump by the sanctuary, apparently overindulged herself over the holidays. Thankfully, in just a few weeks, she had successfully trimmed down to a more natural weight, and she was released back to the countryside at the end of January. Her carers only wish, however, that she does not overfeed herself again.
(Image Credit: Suffolk Owl Sanctuary/ The Dodo)