TAWNY OWL 



409 



with grey, the face-disk is tinged with chestnut, and the breast is 

 generally white with streaks and bars of chestnut-brown, the latter 

 produced by broad tips of that colour to the feathers of the middle 

 region. In sonne specimens, however, the breast is mottled with 

 pale chestnut, the white barrings being less in evidence ; while other 

 individual variations in colour -details are b}- no means uncommon. 

 In the grc\' phase the upper- parts are streaked with dusk}' brown 



MOUNTED IN THE ROWLAND WARD STUDIOS 



T.WV.NV OWLS (.M.VLE .WD FE.M.VLE). 



and stippled with wavy bars on a gre\- ground, the breast-feathers 

 being white with brown arrow-head markings. That these two phases 

 have a meaning is almost certain, and until this is explained ornitholo- 

 gists have done only half their work ; the mere record of the fact 

 being practically useless. When first hatched, the nestlings are clothed 

 in grey down, but this is succeeded while they are still in the nest 

 by a "fluffy" plumage of which the feathers are buff tipped with 

 white and thickly barred with pale brown on both surfaces. 



iAlthough resident throughout Great Britain, from Sk}-e and the 



