Athena, like her namesake, is noble and tough. She grips her perch with needle-tipped talons and peers straight into my eyes through what feels like the back of my head. After a motionless minute, the white-feathered barn owl blinks and swivels her head to study the other person standing in the backyard of the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History.
"Kids like to get in staring contests with her," chuckled John O'Brien, one of Athena's caretakers and a volunteer with the Santa Barbara Audubon Society's Eyes in the Sky (EITS) education program. "Their eyes get as big as saucers."
Then we stepped into Ivan's habitat. The red-tailed hawk craned his head and flared his wings as he gave us a more forceful look. He seemed to know O'Brien. "Every bird has a distinct personality," O'Brien explained. "And after a while, they learn to recognize us."