Each evening bird lover Tom Rowe stood in his backkyard in Devon, England, hooting like an owl -- and one night, an owl called back to him.

For a year, the man and his feathered friend hooted back and forth. Rowe even kept a log of the "conversation." Just as Rowe thought he was on the verge of a breakthrough in inter- species communication, his wife had a chat with next door neighbor, Nancy Hollis. "My husband spends his nights... calling out to owls, " said Mrs. Rowe. "That's odd, " Mrs. Hollis replied. "So does my John."