every year, americans spend over $9 billion on pest control services. a significant portion of that goes toward rodent management — traps, poisons, exclusion work, repeat visits.
meanwhile, a single great horned owl family consumes roughly 4,000 rodents per year. for free.
the silent workforce
great horned owls (bubo virginianus) are the most widespread owl species in the americas. from the arctic tundra to the tip of south america, from dense forests to suburban backyards, these apex predators have adapted to nearly every habitat the continent offers.
their job description is simple: hunt at night, eat anything from mice to rabbits to skunks (they're one of the few predators that regularly take skunks), and maintain balance in ecosystems that would otherwise be overrun.
farmers and ranchers have long understood this. owl boxes on agricultural land aren't charity — they're infrastructure. a breeding pair of great horned owls patrolling your fields is worth more than monthly pest control visits, and they don't send invoices.
the poison paradox
here's where it gets dark.
the most common approach to rodent control in north america is anticoagulant rodenticides — poisons that cause internal bleeding over several days. a poisoned rat doesn't die immediately. it gets slow, disoriented, easy to catch.
which means it becomes an easy meal for an owl.
secondary poisoning is now one of the leading threats to raptor populations across north america. studies have found anticoagulant residues in over 80% of tested owls and hawks. we're systematically poisoning the very predators that would do this work naturally — and then paying pest control companies to fill the gap their absence creates.
it's not just inefficient. it's a feedback loop of destruction.
what great horned owls are actually worth
ecologists call this "ecosystem services" — the work that nature does for free when we let it. rodent control is just one line item:
- agricultural protection: reduced crop damage, lower grain storage losses
- disease suppression: rodents carry hantavirus, leptospirosis, plague. fewer rodents, less transmission risk.
- ecosystem balance: as apex predators, owls regulate populations throughout the food web
- indicator species: owl population health reflects the overall health of their habitat
the problem is that these services are invisible in our economic system. no one writes a check to the owls. their work shows up nowhere on a balance sheet. so when we make decisions about land use, pesticide application, or development, owl labor gets a value of zero.
which means it gets traded away for things that do have a price.
revaluing the predator
the great horned owl doesn't need us to save it — yet. the species remains widespread and adaptable. but "least concern" is not the same as "thriving," and the trends point in only one direction.
what would it mean to actually value this species? not symbolically, but economically?
it would mean landowners getting compensated for maintaining owl habitat. it would mean pest control shifting away from poisons that enter the food chain. it would mean the billions we spend on rodent control getting partially redirected to the systems that do it better.
ensurance approaches this by creating financial instruments tied to species protection. the bubo virginianus | great horned owl coin generates trading fees that flow to habitat protection and conservation work. it's a way of pricing what's currently priced at zero.
what you can do
- avoid rodenticides — snap traps, exclusion, and habitat modification work without poisoning the food chain
- install owl boxes — if you have rural or suburban land, a nesting box costs under $100 and lasts years
- support habitat conservation — old trees with cavities are increasingly rare, and owls need them for nesting
- hold the coin — every trade of the great horned owl ensurance coin funds the headwaters flow that supports real conservation work
the owl is already doing the work. the question is whether we're smart enough to stop undercutting it.