Pictured: The 100,000-to-one black barn owl



All barn owls are precious, but none more than this jet-black two year old.

Sable has melanism - a 100,000-to-one gene mutation that makes her the opposite to an albino.

Black owls are usually killed as chicks by their mothers who reject their colouring.



Black and white: Sable (left) has melanism and would be attacked by other owls in the wild

But Sable, pictured at Hereford Owl Rescue with Petra, a normal barn owl, survived because she was born in captivity.

She is one of only three in Britain and Baroness Sasa Vonbarth und Kippenruer, who runs the rescue charity, described her as peculiar but very beautiful.

She added: 'Strangely, Sable is much stronger than a normal barn owl whereas an albino is weaker and has a bad immune system. However, if she got out into the wild she'd be dead in 12 hours. You would think black would work at night but in reality she would be mobbed and killed by other owls.'

Barn owls were in decline in Britain but are making a comeback with 8,000 breeding pairs in the wild.

Baroness Von Barth Und Kippenruer, who runs the Hereford Owl Rescue sanctuary, proudly holds Sable and Petra

Sable's dark colouring is the result of melanism, a 1 in 100,000 mutation