STRIGID.^. 



307 





THE SCOPS-OWL. 



Scops giu (Scopoli). 



This Owl, the smallest which occurs in the British Islands, was 

 first noticed as a visitor in the spring of 1805, when specimens 

 were obtained in Yorkshire. Since that time examples have been 

 recorded from Northamptonshire, Essex, Middlesex, Bucks. Berks, 

 Wilts, Cornwall, Pembrokeshire, Cheshire, Lancashire and Cumber- 

 land ; four occurrences are authenticated in Norfolk, and there are 

 records from the south-east of Yorkshire. The often-repeated story 

 of the breeding of the Scops-Owl at Castle-Eden Dene in Durham 

 is untrue. One was killed in Sutherland late in May 1S54 ; the late 

 Col. Drummond-Hay has recorded a pair shot at Scone in May 1864 ; 

 Mr. G. Sim says that one was picked up dead near Kintore on 

 September 2nd 1891 ; and one was taken alive at the lighthouse 

 on North Ronaldshay, Orkneys, on June 2nd 1892. Li Ireland one 

 was killed in co. Meath in 1837, one in Wexford in the spring of 

 1847, a third near Belfast in November 1883, and a fourth in 

 Wexford on May 31st 1889. 



The Scops-Owl is only a summer-visitor even to the temperate 

 portions of Europe, exceptionally extending its migrations to 

 Heligoland (once), Holland, Belgium, Northern France and Switzer- 

 land. South of the Alps and Carpathians it is not uncommon ; 

 while in Southern France, the Spanish Peninsula, Italy, and east- 

 ward to Greece, Turkey and Southern Russia, it becomes abundant. 



B B 2 



