Museum of Science, Boston

Owl Pellet Dissection at Different Ages

Books for Kids

  • Animal Lives - The Barn Owl
    , by
    Bert Kitchem
  • Owl Babies
    , by
    Martin Waddell & Patrick Benson
  • Owl Puke: Book and Owl Pellet
    , by
    Jane Hammerslough

Contact Us

Contact the Discovery Center and Living Lab staff at livinglab@mos.org

Owl Pellet Dissection: Older Children & Adults



Owl Pellet dissections can be a fun science activity for people of many ages. We provide these generalizations as guidelines about what children at different ages might do while exploring Owl Pellet at the Discovery Center’s Experiment Station, in the kitchen at home, or at school. Listed below are science and technology process skills that children may be practicing during their explorations. Please remember: each child develops at a different rate, so some children in each age group may be able to do some of the things described in the age group before or after their own.

How might older children explore Owl Pellets?

Scaffold - Older Children & Adults

Older children and grownups can help young children find the smaller bones (some of which are quite tiny) among the fur and feathers in an owl pellet.

Older children and adults can show young children how to properly use tweezers or a magnifying lens.

They can also remind children of places where they have seen owls, rodents or other animals related to the activity in other contexts.