Wedding was 'owl' a bit much for Darcey the ring bearing bird

Bride and groom were left stranded at the alter as Darcey the night owl slept through the wedding day

Weddings can be a tiring day for all involved, but for one guest the ceremony proved exhausting.

Darcey had been entrusted with the extremely important role of ring bearer during a service at the Holy Cross Church in Sherston, Wiltshire. The barn owl was expected to fly down from the rafters before presenting the rings for the priest.

Instead Darcey, adorned with red ribbons especially for the occasion, decided to take a nap in the church roof through out the whole ceremony, causing the wedding to be delayed for over an hour.

Despite several attempts from guests to wake her up, Reverend Chris Bryan decided to press ahead with the proceedings using back up rings as Darcey snoozed on amongst the rafters.

As far as Rev. Bryan was concerned, a winged ring bearer "would have been absolutely superb — if it worked.” Speaking to The Times, he said having Darcey bear the rings had been the bride's mothers idea, and it was "a complete surprise to the groom".

“The groom is into falconry as a bit of a hobby", he explained, "and so it was secretly arranged for two falconers to suddenly appear at the moment when the best man hands over the rings".

It was left to Mr Bryan to fetch a ladder and eventually coax Darcey down, long after the couple had been pronounced husband and wife.

He added: “We all had a bit of a laugh about it and then we tried to get it down, but it didn’t come. In fact it fell asleep. It presumably thought, ‘I’m a barn owl, this is like a barn’."