Having arrived at Charleston, South Carolina, in October 1833, as soon as my family and myself were settled in the house of my friend the Reverend John Bachman, I received information that a pair of Owls (of the present species) had a nest in the upper story of an abandoned sugar-house in the city, when I immediately proceeded to the place, accompanied by Dr Samuel Wilson and William Kunhardt, Esq. We ascended cautiously to the place, I having pulled off my boots to prevent noise. When we reached it I found a sort of large garret filled with sugar-moulds, and lighted by several windows, one of which had two panes broken. I at once discovered the spot where the Owls were, by the hissing sounds of the young ones, and approached slowly and cautiously towards them, until within a few feet, when the parent bird seeing me, flew quickly toward the window, touched the frame of the broken panes, and glided silently through the aperture. I could not even afterwards observe the course of its flight. The young were three in number, and covered with down of a rich cream colour. They raised themselves on their legs, appeared to swell, and emitted a constant hissing sound, somewhat resembling that of a large snake when angry. They continued thus without altering their position, during the whole of our stay, which lasted about twenty minutes. They were on a scattered parcel of bits of straw, and surrounded by a bank made of their ejected pellets. Very few marks of their excrements were on the floor, and they were beautifully clean. A Cotton Rat, newly caught, and still entire, lay beside them, and must have been brought from a distance of several miles, that animal abounding in the rice-fields, none of which, I believe, are nearer than three or four miles. After making some arrangements with the Negro man who kept the house, we returned home. The eggs from which these young Owls had been hatched must have been laid six weeks before this date, or about the 15th of September.
On the 25th of November they had grown much in size, but none of the feathers had yet made their appearance, excepting the primaries, which were now about an inch long, thick, full of blood, and so tender that the least pressure of the fingers might have burst them. As the young grow more and more, the parents feed and attend to them less frequently than when very small, coming to them in the night only with food. This proves the caution of these birds in avoiding danger, and the faculty which the young possess of supporting abstinence in this middle state of their growth.
On the 7th of December I visited the Owls in company with my friend John Bachman. We found them much grown; indeed, their primaries were well out; but their back and breast, and all their lower parts, were still thickly covered with down.
On the 6th of January I again saw them, but one of the young was dead, although in good condition. I was surprised that their food still continued to be composed entirely of small quadrupeds, and principally of the rat mentioned above.
My last visit to them was on the 18th of January. The two younger ones were now, to all appearance, fully grown, but were yet unable to fly. A few tufts of down still remained attached to the feathers on scattered parts of the body. I took them home. One was killed, and the skin preserved.
Now, these facts are the more interesting, that none of the numerous European authors with whom I am acquainted, have said a single word respecting the time of breeding of this species, but appear to be more intent on producing long lists of synonyms than on presenting the useful materials from which the student of nature can draw inferences. I shall therefore leave to them to say whether our species is, or is not, the same as the one found in the churches and ruins of Europe. Should it prove to be the same species, and if the European bird breeds, as I suspect it does, at so different a period of the year, the habits of the American Owl will form a kind of mystery in the operations of nature, as they differ not only from those of the bird in question, but of all other Owls with which I am acquainted.
My opinion is, that the Barn Owl of the United States is far more abundant in the Southern Districts than in the other parts. I never found it to the east of Pennsylvania, and only twice in that State, nor did I ever see, or even hear of one in the Western Country; but as soon as I have reached the maritime districts of the Carolinas, Georgia, the Floridas, and all along to Louisiana, the case has always been different. In Cuba they are quite abundant, according to the reports which I have received from that island. I am indeed almost tempted to believe, that the few which have been found in Pennsylvania were bewildered birds, surprised by the coldness of the winter, and perhaps unable to return to the Southern Districts. During my visit to Labrador I neither saw any of these birds, nor found a single person who had ever seen them, although the people to whom I spoke were well acquainted with the Snowy Owl, the Grey Owl, and the Hawk Owl.
Thomas Butler King, Esq., of St Simon's Island, Georgia, sent me two very beautiful specimens of this Owl, which had been caught alive. One died shortly after their arrival at Charleston; the other was in fine order when I received it. The person to whose care they were consigned, kept them for many weeks at Charleston before I reached that city, and told me that in the night their cries never failed to attract others of the same species, which he observed hovering about the place of their confinement.
This species is altogether nocturnal or crepuscular, and when disturbed during the day, flies in an irregular bewildered manner, as if at a loss how to look for a place of refuge. After long observation, I am satisfied that our bird feeds entirely on the smaller species of quadrupeds, for I have never found any portions of birds about their nests, nor even the remains of a single feather in the pellets which they regurgitate, and which are always formed of the bones and hair of quadrupeds.
Owls which approach to the diurnal species in their habits, or which hunt for food in the morning and evening twilight, are more apt to seize on objects which are themselves more diurnal than otherwise, or than the animals which I have found to form the constant food of our Barn Owl. Thus the Short-eared, the Hawk, the Fork-tailed, the Burrowing, and other Owls, which hunt either during broad day, or mostly towards evening, or at the return of day, will be found to feed more on mixed food than the present species. I have no doubt that the anatomist will detect corresponding differences in the eye, as they have already been found in the ear. The stomach is elongated, almost smooth, and of a deep gamboge-yellow; the intestines small, rather tough, and measuring one foot nine inches in length.