But who has stirred a Barn Owl? Over the dew-laden meadows he stands guard, or perhaps at the edge of the moonlit corn-fields, waiting for the only prey that seems to interest him. He knows the country like a book, the runways of the meadow mouse, the house mouse’s path from corn shock to corn shock, the mole’s early morning starting point.
Under the old buttonball tree the broods of young chickens ran from early morning to night. The owner felt that the large Owls were a menace to his flock and watched for them with a gun. But, with the fall of the old tree and a study of their food, a new light has spread to every farm in that vicinity.
I heard the young Owl’s last ‘rasp’ on October 16; it was full of the weird power which thrills one in the dark hours. A few minutes later, a big bird flew low toward the orchard—the young Owls had taken to hunting at last.
The Migration of North American Birds
Compiled by Prof. W. W. Cooke, Chiefly from Data in the Biological Survey
With a drawing by Louis Agassiz Fuertes