MONTANA HORNED OWL 349 



owls slowly became tamer and less disturbed by the autos and 

 picnickers below them. 



Rockwell (1908) gives a good description: "The nest was a badly 

 dilapidated magpie's nest from which all the top had weathered away 

 except a portion which shielded the bird from the north, leaving a 

 rather flat platform of sticks not unlike an old hawk's nest, and was 

 situated about 15 feet from the ground in a small cotton wood tree 

 about 8 inches in diameter. The depression of the nest cavity was 

 quite shallow and was unlined except for a thin layer of leathers from 

 the parent's breast, upon which, together with some dead leaves and 

 similar trash the egg w T as deposited." 



Lowe (1895) says that "here in Pueblo County, where diminutive 

 junipers struggle for existence among the limestone hillsides, and 

 whose branches, unlike those of the gigantic sycamores, sweep the 

 ground rather than the sky, Bubo virginianus [occidentalis] nests at a 

 very low height. It is unusual to find a nest higher than twenty feet, 

 and fifteen feet is about the average, while twelve feet and even eight 

 are not infrequently noted. Nesting sites of birds very often appear 

 to be governed by surroundings. Thus it will be seen that the 

 Western Horned Owl, when nesting in a locality like the above, is 

 compelled to build very low." Other naturalists have noted this 

 also. Sillovvay (1901) says: 



As the female was thus abroad, it was necessary for me to climb to each sus- 

 pected nest, not knowing the precise site; and guided by my experience with 

 Bubo in Illinois, where sycamores grow tall and Bubos nest high, I ascended to 

 several that were conspicuously high. At length, having examined all the likely 

 sites, I concluded that the occupied nest must be an insignificant affair in the top 

 of a slender tree. Pushing through the thicket to reach the tree, I discovered a 

 large lean-to nest against the trunk of a small tree, the distance of the structure 

 from the ground being only ten feet. * * * I scrambled up the trunk from 

 sheer force of habit, and ah, there were two eggs. 



Seemingly, Montana horned owls do not often make nests of their 

 own. Even when it comes to material added to an old nest, there is 

 quite a bit of variation as to presence of any nesting material at all. 

 V. L. Marsh writes us of a nest where the eggs were lying upon the 

 bare, rocky material of the site without any other material of any 

 kind. In places these birds make their nests on the ground. Cam- 

 eron (1907) says that this owl "nests indifferently in the river valleys 

 or pine hills. A pair of Hoot Owls reared their young on my ranch 

 in Custer County for many years, repairing the same nest, often but 

 a storm swept fragment, each spring in the same box-elder tree. 

 Almost before winter is fairly over (about third week of March) 

 the female begins to lay. * * * While one of the pair is on the 

 nest, the other sits silent in a tree, its plumage assimilating so closely 

 to the bark, whether box elder or willow, as to render the bird invisible 

 even when the tree is leafless." Mr. Bent (1907) has noted that 



