LONG-EARED OWL 271 



fifth. On June 21 the owl was sitting. The nest was 

 not regularly visited for fear of disturbing the bird, but 

 the first egg was not there on May 27. July 2, one young 

 bn-d and five eggs in the nest ; July 25 three young birds. 



Family ASIONID^. 



Genus ASIO, Brisson. 



LONG-EAEED OWL. 



Asio otus (Linnaeus). B.N., i., p. 132 (1766). 

 Eared Owl, Boys, 3792. 



This species is not plentiful in many parts of Kent, 

 but in the more open woodlands it is frequently met 

 with, singly or in pairs. It is only a winter visitor to 

 the county, and therefore only observed during the 

 Partridge and Pheasant shooting season, when driven 

 from its hiding places. 



It was obtained by Mr. E. J. Balston, who shot one 

 of these birds in the winter of 1871, when ferreting 

 rabbits on the Boxley Hills. It flew out of a yew tree. 

 As it had got some distance before seen it was only 

 winged ; when taken up it hissed and snapped its bill 

 repeatedly. Another was obtained by a keeper on Boxley 

 Hills on February 20, 1894. A specimen in the Maid- 

 stone Museum was procured by Mr. W. Hickmot on 

 December 22, 1882, and a male was shot by Colonel 

 Franklyn, at Hollingbourne, on November 28, 1891. 

 This bird was being mobbed by small birds in a fir 

 tree ; when shot it had a Linnet in its claws. The 

 Eev. C. H. Fielding observed this species at Addington 

 in the winter of 1892-3. Mr. E. J. Balston found it in 

 the Orlestone district in 1902. 



