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British Woman Becomes ‘Star’ for Saving Starving Owl

A tawny owl. (Getty Images)
A tawny owl. (Getty Images)
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British Woman Becomes ‘Star’ for Saving Starving Owl

A tawny owl. (Getty Images)
A tawny owl. (Getty Images)

A woman has become an unlikely social media star in her Cornish village - all thanks to a family of tawny owls, reported the BBC on Friday.

Diane Knight had set up a CCTV system so she could watch the owls nesting in her barn near Carnon Downs, Cornwall.

But when the male owl stopped bringing the female food, Knight stepped in.

Her work to supply the owl and the baby owlet with dead mice has proved popular on the village's Facebook page.

Knight's owl obsession started through watching the pair of tawny owls on a nest-cam she had set up.

She said the male owl was injured in a fight with a rival owl and stopped bringing the female the food she needed while sitting on her single egg.

Knight, 69, took advice and started buying dead mice, stocked as snake food by local pet shops, soon racking up a bill of more than £100.

She was told to place the mice on a nearby beam to avoid disturbing the nest, which involved climbing up a 15ft (4.5m) ladder.

She also started to share stills and video on the Carnon Downs And Surrounding Area Notice Board on Facebook and was inundated with offers of help from followers.

"They've been brilliant," she said. "One gentlemen paid for 30 and another lady she paid for 20 so I've got 50 dead mice waiting for me.

"We've got enough now, we've got a freezerful," she added, according to the BBC.

Her regular owl updates on Facebook are attracting dozens of likes and comments.

"I am a little bit addicted to it myself, I haven't watched television for months," she said.

"I cannot believe how one little owlet has brought the community together.

"I went to the dentist and the first thing they said to me is 'Are you the Owl Lady of Carnon Downs?'"

Knight has named the owlet Dorothea - Dotty for short - and is hoping the young bird is soon learn to fly, leave the nest and hunt for its own mice dinners.

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Varieties

Greece's 'Instagram Island' Santorini nears Saturation Point

Tourists queue as they wait to take a picture from one of the balconies. Aris Oikonomou / AFP
Tourists queue as they wait to take a picture from one of the balconies. Aris Oikonomou / AFP
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Greece's 'Instagram Island' Santorini nears Saturation Point

Tourists queue as they wait to take a picture from one of the balconies. Aris Oikonomou / AFP
Tourists queue as they wait to take a picture from one of the balconies. Aris Oikonomou / AFP

One of the most enduring images of Greece's summer travel brand is the world-famous sunset on Santorini Island, framed by sea-blue church domes on a jagged cliff high above a volcanic caldera.
This scene has inspired millions of fridge magnets, posters, and souvenirs -- and now the queue to reach the viewing spot in the clifftop village of Oia can take more than 20 minutes, said AFP.
Santorini is a key stopover of the Greek cruise experience. But with parts of the island nearing saturation, officials are considering restrictions.
Of the record 32.7 million people who visited Greece last year, around 3.4 million, or one in 10, went to the island of just 15,500 residents.
"We need to set limits if we don't want to sink under overtourism," Santorini mayor Nikos Zorzos told AFP.
"There must not be a single extra bed... whether in the large hotels or Airbnb rentals."
As the sun set behind the horizon in Oia, thousands raised their phones to the sky to capture the moment, followed by scattered applause.
For canny entrepreneurs, the Cycladic island's famous sunset can be a cash cow.
One company advertised more than 50 "flying dresses", which have long flowing trains, for up to 370 euros ($401), on posters around Oia for anyone who wishes to "feel like a Greek goddess" or spruce up selfies.
'Respect Oia'
But elsewhere in Oia's narrow streets, residents have put up signs urging visitors to respect their home.
"RESPECT... It's your holiday... but it's our home," read a purple sign from the Save Oia group.
Shaped by a volcanic eruption 3,600 years ago, Santorini's landscape is "unique", the mayor said, and "should not be harmed by new infrastructure".
Around a fifth of the island is currently occupied by buildings.
At the edge of the cliff, a myriad of swimming pools and jacuzzis highlight Santorini is also a pricey destination.
In 2023, 800 cruise ships brought some 1.3 million passengers, according to the Hellenic Ports Association.
Cruise ships "do a lot of harm to the island", said Chantal Metakides, a Belgian resident of Santorini for 26 years.
"When there are eight or nine ships pumping out smoke, you can see the layer of pollution in the caldera," she said.
Cruise ship limits
In June, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis floated the possibility of capping cruise ship arrivals to Greece's most popular islands.
"I think we'll do it next year," he told Bloomberg, noting that Santorini and tourist magnet Mykonos "are clearly suffering".
"There are people spending a lot of money to be on Santorini and they don’t want the island to be swamped," said the pro-business conservative leader, who was re-elected to a second four-year term last year.
In an AFP interview, Tourism Minister Olga Kefalogianni echoed this sentiment and said: "We must set quotas because it's impossible for an island such as Santorini... to have five cruise ships arriving at the same time."
Local officials have set a limit of 8,000 cruise boat passengers per day from next year.
But not all local operators agree.
Antonis Pagonis, head of Santorini's hoteliers association, believes better visitor flow management is part of the solution.
"It is not possible to have (on) a Monday, for example, 20 to 25,000 guests from the cruise ships, and the next day zero," he said.
Pagonis also argued that most of the congestion only affects parts of the island like the capital, Fira.
In the south of the island, the volcanic sand beaches are less crowded, even though it is high season in July.
'I'm in Türkiye
The modern tourism industry has also changed visitor behavior.
"I listened (to) people making a FaceTime call with the family, saying 'I'm in Türkiye," smiled tourist guide Kostas Sakavaras.
"They think that the church over there is a mosque because yesterday they were in Türkiye."
The veteran guide said the average tourist coming to the island has changed.
"Instagram has defined the way people choose the places to visit," he said, explaining everybody wants the perfect Instagram photo to confirm their expectations.