Athena earns Austin's highest owl honor

Yes, but: If we're handing out important titles to a bird, how sure are we that it's the same gal snoozing in a sotol planter each spring?

How it works: Great horned owls don't actually make their own nests. Instead, they use nests built by other birds or settle down on ledges, cliffs or tree cavities.

• That means the nests often deteriorate so much in one season that's it's unable to be used again.

I checked in with Wildflower Center spokesperson Scott Simons to ask how confident they feel that it's the same bird.

• "We do not have Athena tagged in any way, and great horned owls are particularly difficult to identify by markings, due to their mottled coloring, so we cannot guarantee that this is the same owl," Simons says.
• "But they do indeed return to the same nest location, so we believe it is the same owl."

Zoom in: Perhaps Athena has duped us, but Ben Walters, who oversees Cornell Lab's bird cams project, said it's pretty likely we're seeing the same bird each year, thanks to the sturdy concrete ledge at the Wildflower Center.

• "It's not uncommon to see great horned owls return to the same nest site year after year if it's still suitable the next breeding season," Walters tells me.

The bottom line: After an hour's worth of reporting on a bird, I feel slightly more confident that Athena is still Athena.

• "The tough thing about birds is we can't talk to them or ask them questions," Walters says.