NATURAL HISTORY OF SOUTH AFRICA 



pellets containing the skulls or portions of skulls of 

 1,089 mice, and those of 71 rats, as well as the remains 

 of a variety of insects. These results were confirmed 

 by over fifty similar observations at various times and 

 places. 



Although this bird wages nightly warfare on the 

 mice which infest the farmer's barns, stacks, and 

 fields, it is given no mercy. Some farmers, believing 

 it destroys poultry or game, shoot it down at sight; 

 others kill it or allow their children or employees to do 

 so through sheer love of taking life. There is a 

 widespread superstition amongst uneducated country 

 people that if this bird settles on the roof of a house 

 and hoots, one of the members of the household is 

 sure to die. Impelled by this stupid belief these 

 eminently valuable birds are remorselessly killed or 

 driven from the neighbourhood. 



If men regard knowledge as a weariness of the 

 flesh, and neglect to acquire it, they pay dearly for 

 their ignorance, and will continue so to suffer until 

 they awaken from their lethargy. 



There are two distinct classes of owls — the large 

 eagle owls and those of smaller size. The smaller 

 owls, of which there are several species in South 

 Africa, prey chiefly on mice and rats. When 

 this form of prey is scarce, the larger of the insects 

 which are active at night are captured and eaten. 

 The eagle owls, so-called because of their large size, 

 are equally valuable to man, for 90 per cent, of their 

 diet consists of rats and mice. Farmers are far too 

 apt to condemn this extremely valuable bird because it 



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