196 BIRDS IN THEIR RELATIONS TO MAN. 



petent naturalists, both in Europe and America, and the re- 

 sults prove beyond question that the owls as a group are of 

 great value as vermin destroyers. The most complete ac- 

 count of the economic status of these birds as yet published 

 is the report of Dr. A. K. Fisher, of the United States Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture, to which we are indebted for much of 

 the information in this chapter. 



There is but one North American representative of the 

 family Strigidce^ the common Barn-Owl of the Southern and 

 Western States. This handsome bird is occasionally found 

 as far north as New England on the Atlantic coast, while in 

 the Pacific region it extends northward to Oregon. In most 

 parts of the United States it is not an abundant species, but 

 in California it is said to be the commonest of the owls. It 

 nests in towers or hollow trees, depositing from three to six 

 yellowish-white eggs on the mass of regurgitated pellets which 

 have accumulated in its abode. 



The barn-owl is a crepuscular or nocturnal bird, hiding 

 during the day and sallying forth in search of prey during the 

 evening. The record of its food is unusually complete, and 

 shows that on the whole it is a very useful species. Of thirty- 

 nine stomachs examined by Dr. Fisher, one contained a pigeon; 

 three, other birds ; seventeen, mice ; seventeen, other mam- 

 mals ; four, insects ; and seven were empty. These stomachs 

 were collected from Delaware to California, and contained 

 specimens of the following small mammals : meadow-mice, 

 jumping mice, harvest and house mice, white-footed mice, 

 shrews, cotton-rats, pocket-rats, kangaroo-rats, wood-rats, and 

 pouched gophers. Two hundred pellets from beneath a nest 

 of these birds in Washington, D. C, contained four hundred 

 and fifty-four skulls, of which ''two hundred and twenty-five 

 were meadow-mice ; two, pine-mice ; one hundred and 

 seventy -nine, house-mice; twenty, rats; six, jumping mice; 

 twenty, shreAvs ; one, a star-nosed mole ; and one, a vesper- 

 sparrow."' 



