When a country newspaper announces the capture of a creature, half monkey and half bird, the bird student may be fairly certain that someone has found a Barn Owl. The strange, melancholy expression of the bird’s face, its peculiarly awkward, long legs, and its odd habit of bowing, hissing, and swaying back and forth, all make it an object of great curiosity.
The Barn Owl can see perfectly by day, though it is chiefly nocturnal. It preys upon rats, mice, and shrews principally, and is almost altogether beneficial in its food-habits. All Owls have the habit of throwing up wads of indigestible matter, such as the bones and fur of the mice they have eaten. An examination of the pellets of the Barn Owl has shown that these creatures eat but very few birds and virtually no game.
Half-grown young in their nest, clamoring for food, make a considerable outcry. They have insatiable appetites and during early summer the parents are kept busy bringing in rats and mice for their hungry offspring.
The Barn Owl’s golden brown and gray back, its white appearance beneath, and its lack of any ear-tufts are good field-marks. This species is protected in Pennsylvania.
LONG-EARED OWL
Asio otus wilsonianus (Lesson)
Other Names.—Cat Owl; Cedar Owl; Hoot Owl.
Description.—Size medium, about that of a Crow; head with two prominent tufts of feathers which are nearly always held erect in life; feet fully feathered. Upperparts gray, mottled with buffy brown and speckled with black and white; tail with six or eight dark gray bars; face whitish to rich buff, bordered by black; ear-tufts black margined with whitish or buffy; underparts whitish, washed irregularly with buffy—the breast broadly and irregularly streaked and the sides and belly barred with dark brown and gray; feet buffy; eyes bright yellow. Length: 15 inches.
Range in Pennsylvania.—A fairly common, though somewhat local resident, which may migrate to an extent when food is scarce during winter. It is usually to be found near hemlocks.
Nest.—A flat platform of twigs, sometimes built upon the old nest of a squirrel or Crow, lined with finer materials and a few belly feathers from the owls. Sometimes an old Crow nest is used without any renovation or addition. Eggs: 4 to 6, white.
Long-eared and Short-eared Owls
Long-eared Owls are neither noisy nor bold, and may therefore live in a region without being known unless the bird student assiduously searches for them in dense hemlock clumps, in cedars, or thick grape-vine tangles, where they are usually to be found. They are principally nocturnal, and it is sometimes difficult to make the birds fly from their perches during the day. Any medium-sized owl which flies from a dense hemlock is likely to be of this species. Its general appearance, at such a time, is grayish.
It is a highly beneficial bird, living almost altogether on mice which it captures both in the woodlands and at the edges of fields. These it swallows wherever it may be, but the pellets are usually cast up during the daytime at the favorite resting-place, so after a few months’ sojourn at one point the pellets become numerous. Pellets of this nature, strewn over the ground, are always a fairly sure sign of the presence of owls.