Northern Observations of Inland Birds 55 



Unlike the tawny owl the barn owl is exceedingly 

 difficult to rear. When I was a boy I three times made 

 the experiment unsuccessfully. Repeatedly, however, 

 we reared tawny owls. They will eat almost anything 

 they are given — one of my pets, indeed, was found dead, 

 owing to a younger brother having fed it on a tram ticket ! 



As its name implies, the barn owl is very partial to 

 buildings of human construction for nesting purposes. 

 A pair built year after year in a barn near my home, and 

 at day-time we used regularly to visit the old bird as she 

 sat under a skylight among the cobwebs, looking very 

 unnatural and unbirdlike on her meagre nest. 



One pair I knew built in an old stone wall in the centre 

 of the extensive coniferous forests of the Bolton Abbey 

 Estate. On every side of her were dense forests and 

 open moorlands, though only two miles away the abbey 

 ruins were at her disposal, and nearer still, the ruins of 

 Barden Priory. This, probably, was a very unusual 

 choice. 



I have seen it stated in ornithological works that the 

 tawny owl is given to fishing, and of course this may be 

 so, but though, within my own experience, I have come 

 across several examples of the barn owl taking trout I 

 have never known a tawny owl to do so. On the River 

 Wharfe there were, perhaps, fourteen nights in the season 

 when the big trout took to frequenting the very shallow 

 water in pursuit of an insect, the hatchings of which 

 were of brief duration, and during these nights there was 

 little chance of sport for the angler, owing to the abundance 

 of natural feed, and, therefore, I was able to devote 

 many idle minutes to the observation of other wild life. 

 The big trout could be seen moving about on the shallow 

 gravel beds — indeed, for the fun of the thing, I have at 

 such times changed my tackle and foul-hooked fish with a 

 Stewart tackle cast as one casts a fly — and always, on 



