A barn owl emerges from an unseen barn at the forest edge to hunt the pastures and fields that are tucked here and there in a countryside of encroaching woodlands. Unlike the barred owls that haunt the swamps and deep woods, barn owls prefer more open country, and so, do better when farmers are actively keeping the trees at bay. But the old wooden barns they frequent and rely on for nesting are, like the farmland, giving way to changing times and changing land use, and are either becoming overgrown or being replaced by modern metal pole barns. \n\nI love the challenge of painting different species of trees so that they are recognizable, and in this artwork I tackled the sugar maple, the dogwood, sassafras and musclewood, all very common in the southern Missouri of my youth, and added the familiar steeple of the little Lutheran church in the distance whose bell would echo across the valley, calling distant congregants to come down to the church on Cedar Creek.