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E. F. Chaivner—The Nesting of Fraser's Eagle Oivl


THE NESTING OF FRASER’S EAGLE OWL

(BUBO FRASERI )


By E. F. Chawner


I feel that this title is somewhat misleading, for my bird has no

mate, and therefore the “ nesting ” must perforce stop short before

the really interesting part begins. For all that it may be as well to

record the attempt, for as far as I know this species has not previously

gone to nest in England. Moreover, my bird is so extraordinarily

tame that all her ways can be noted.


When I bought her in 1912 she was still in nestling plumage ; an

egg was dropped in 1918, but she did not attempt to sit. This year she

called loudly and persistently a shrill single hoot, from the middle

of January onwards, and evidently desired a mate, but unfortunately

none was procurable. On March 5 I found her on the floor of her

house with an egg which she intended to incubate, but as it is the duty

of the male bird to prepare the “ scrape ” none was provided, and the

egg rolled about and would inevitably have been broken. She made

no objection to my making a scrape for her in a dry secluded corner

of the aviary, the floor of which is of coarse sand, and when I placed

the egg in it she followed and I left her quietly sitting. Ths egg is of

the usual Owl type, round and white, rather large, about the bigness

of a Leghorn hen’s egg.


She sits very steadily, and has settled down to a regular routine.

I go to her about noon, and we exchange a few remarks and caresses,

after which I give her a mouse or a few morsels of rabbit, which she

takes from my hand. Presently she comes off the nest and flies to

her perch, where she preens and stretches herself, in the sun if possible.

In about ten minutes’ time she flies back to her egg, alighting about

a yard from it, and walks to the scrape, turns the egg and settles down

with it between her legs, with her talons carefully folded on either side

of it. Normally I suppose there would be two eggs in a clutch, but

I do not know whether youth or the absence of the male is responsible

for only one being laid in this case.


She takes very little food, one mouse or a sparrow in twenty-four

hours (though more is provided it is not touched), and she likes to have



