Juliet has attended many weddings and is a professional. As the happy couple exchange vows, she emerges from a dark box and leaps into the gloved arm of Duncan Blake, her handler. With a 270 degree turn of her head, she observes her surroundings.
Suddenly, a screeching sound sets her in motion. Whoosh, she flies down the hall, with two rings in a small bag tied around her slim ankles. The gasps come from the humans sitting beneath her outstretched wings. Seconds later, she lands on another outstretched arm, often belonging to the best man, other times the bride or groom.
For a moment, Juliet is the star of the ceremony. After handing over the rings, she flies back into Mr. Blake’s arm and receives her reward: a raw chicken leg.
He then leaves the room as quickly as he entered (over 50 million years of evolution and about 90 seconds of action later) as the humans turn their attention to the couple.
By now you will have realized that Juliet is an owl, one of several in Britain that have been trained to play a leading role in wedding ceremonies.
The ‘Harry Potter’ effect
The idea of an owl at a wedding gained traction in Britain more than 15 years ago, according to the people who make their living providing them. They attribute the rise directly to the popularity of “Harry Potter,” in which owls serve as mail carriers for the wizarding world.
“They are a mainstay of British weddings,” said Zoe Burke, editor of the wedding planning website Hitched. Social media also plays a role, she said, with BookTok fueling the popularity of literary-themed weddings not only in Britain but also in the United States and elsewhere.
“Millennials love trends,” Burke said.
For many couples, whether they like magic or not, the owl’s presence is meant to give guests a special experience, Burke said. This was the case for Lucy and Scott Robinson, who said “I do” in April, on a sunny and windy Tuesday afternoon in Stoke-on-Trent, England. It was at her wedding that Juliet, the owl, took her star turn.
“We’re not particular ‘Harry Potter’ fans,” Robinson, 31, said. The couple was looking for a special surprise for their guests and during an Internet search they came across the owl option.
Adding birds to the wedding, Robinson, 33, said, seemed “a no-brainer.”
“Birds make a difference.”
At Robinson’s wedding, Juliet was one of the seven birds present. Mr. Blake, a falconer from Bird on the Hand, brought the birds of prey (including a steppe eagle, a gyrfalcon and a Harris’s falcon) to entertain guests with a bird show during the reception, during which Guests took turns riding the falconer’s gloves and perching the birds on their arms.
While costs vary depending on the service, the birds’ performance at Robinson’s wedding cost 745 pounds (about $951). Photos with guests cost more (about $96 for half an hour). Couples can also opt for a mini falconry experience in addition to a static display, which includes birds flying back and forth between guests, for 699 pounds (about $893).
The bride’s father, Dean McAllister, a longtime bird watcher, said he was thrilled to feel the weight of a bird on his arm for the first time (he was holding a steppe eagle). “It’s a stroke of genius as far as I’m concerned,” he said.
“I’m not a man of occasions,” Mr. McAllister added, “but birds make a difference.”
For those who don’t like to be stared at too much, the bird serves another function: it takes some of the pressure off. As the owl swooped down on Robinson’s wedding guests, everyone looked up. For a few seconds, the eyes moved away from the bride.
“I don’t like too much attention,” Ms. Robinson said.
Her boyfriend said he found the creatures very beautiful to look at. “I really like birds,” Mr. Robinson said, and he thought the birds made the guests feel comfortable. “No one feels left out.”
“It could have gone horribly wrong.”
Generally, owl performances at weddings go smoothly, said Mr. Blake, the falconer. He has been taking Juliet to weddings for five years, he said, and she has never left with the rings.
Of course, from time to time something goes wrong. For example, a bride who has an owl perched on her arm for a period of time might not end up with an all-white wedding dress. And in 2018, an owl delivered rings at the altar and then attacked a wedding guest in Cheshire, England.
Yvonne Forrester, recorder of Staffordshire Council who officiated at Robinson’s wedding, said it was the third to feature an owl. Her nephew got married using an owl as a ring bearer, she said. At that wedding, the owl had to fly across a small body of water. Instead, the owl flew into the forest, carrying the royal rings, delaying the ceremony for half an hour as members of the wedding party frantically chased after it.
Sarah Elvin, a wedding photographer who has photographed hundreds of weddings over the past 15 years across Britain, said that when the trend first took hold more than a decade ago, “there was barely a wedding” without a ring bearer. flying. Since the pandemic, she said, she has seen owls return as a mainstay at British weddings.
For guests in Stoke-on-Trent this spring, the birds were a novelty and entertainment as the couple posed for photographs.
“They’re quite magnificent,” said Richard Finch, 33, a friend and current housemate of the Robinsons, adding that he had never seen birds of prey at a wedding. “It’s very different,” Mr. Finch said, looking at the birds displayed on their perches. He said he found the birds a little intimidating (“they put the fear of God in you”), but that he also felt “a little sorry for them.”
Animal rights advocates do not support the use of birds of prey at weddings or as any form of entertainment. Isobel McNally, of the charity Freedom for Animals, said having owls as ring bearers went against the birds’ nocturnal instinct to rest during the day.
“Owls are wild animals and should be respected as such,” Ms McNally said. “It is totally unethical and immoral to have owls for performance and entertainment.”
Mr Blake, the falconer, said the work he did with birds was not just about entertainment but also about education and conservation efforts.
“Our birds are well cared for and exercise regularly; we also make sure they are not under stress when they are at public events,” he said.
Dealing with wild animals always carries some risk. “It could have gone horribly wrong,” Ms. Robinson said after Juliet successfully presented the rings to her best man, Mitch Herod.
“It was easy,” said Herod, a school friend of the groom. In the end, the only minor hiccup was due to human error, something Herod readily admitted: “I dropped my rings.”