OWLS 



99 



Some years ago, 1 had a gcjod o])|)()riuiiity to 

 make an intimate study of a I'arn (Jwl family. 

 They had a nest in the gable end of my neigh- 

 bor's barn and occupiecl it for a nunil)er of years. 

 This year they had three young, and at three 

 weeks old they were the funniest, fuzziest, 

 " monkey-faced " little creatures 1 had ever seen. 

 They blinked, snapped their bills, and hissed like 

 a box full of snakes. They bobbed and screwed 

 around in more funny attitudes than any con- 

 tortionist you ever saw. 



We crept out one night and hid in a brush heap 

 by the barn. Before long the scratching and soft 

 hissing of the young Owls told us that their 

 breakfast time had come. The curtain of the 

 night had fallen. The day creatures were at 

 rest. Suddenly a shadow flared across the dim-lit 

 sky. The young Owls in some way knew of the 

 approach of food, for there was a sudden out- 

 burst in the nest box like the whistle of escaping 

 steam. .Vgain and again the shadow came and 

 went. Then 1 crept into the barn, felt m\' way 

 up and edged along the rafters to the old box. 

 As soon as food was brought, I lit a match and 

 saw one of the half-grown young tearing the head 

 from the body of a young gopher. 



Barn Owls are always hungry. They will eat 

 their own weight in food every night, and more, 

 if they can get it. To supply such ravenous 

 children, their parents ransack the gardens, fields 

 and orchards industriously night after night and 

 catch as many mice, gophers, and other ground 

 creatures as a dozen cats. For this reason, it 

 would be difficult to find birds that are more use- 

 ful about any farming community. Yet many 

 times people kill these Owls through ignorance 

 of their value or from idle curiosity. 



A case is on record where a half-grown Barn 

 Owl was given all the mice it could eat. It 

 swallowed eight, one after another and the ninth 

 followed all but the tail, which for a long time 

 hung out of the bird's mouth. In three hours, 

 this same bird was ready for a second meal and 

 swallowed four more mice. 



The Owl is not jjarticular when he eats. He 

 put his feet on his game to hold it, then tears 

 it to pieces with his hooked beak, swallowing the 

 entire animal, meat, bones, fur, and all. In the 

 stomach, the nutritions portions are absorbed 

 and the indigestible matter is formed into round 

 pellets and disgorged. About the Owl's roost or 

 Vol.. II— 8 



near its home, one may often fmd these ])cllets 

 in great numbers. A scientist, by examining 

 these, can tell exactly what the bird lias been 

 eating. He can also get a careful estimate of 

 the size and number of the Owl's meals. 



The best known record we have concerning the 

 food of the I'arn Owl is that which was made 



Photo by tj. A. LultriJi;u 



BARN OWL 



It is always hungry and will eat its own weight in food every 

 night 



from a pair that occupied one of the towers of 

 the Smithsonian Institution at Washington, D. C. 

 Dr. A. K. Fisher, who is our greatest authority 

 on the food of Hawks and Owls, examined two 

 hundred pellets from this pair of birds. These 

 showed a total of 454 skulls. There were 225 

 meadow mice, 2 pine mice, 179 house mice, 20 

 rats, 6 jumping mice, 20 shrew\s, i star-nosed 

 mole and i Vesper Sparrow. 



WlLLI.\M L. Fl.VLEV. 



