Notes on the Birds. 345 
uary 8, 1879, two taken, one red, one gray; 14th, one gray.; 16th, one gray; 
and February 25, one gray. 
The red and the gray color phases appear to be about equally common. 
The food of the Screech Owl is chiefly small rodents and insects; it never 
takes chickens. A pair of screech owls about a farm are worth much more 
than a eat in destroying mice. This species should be thoroughly pro- 
tected. 
92. BUBO VIRGINIANUS VIRGINIANUS (Gmelin). GREAT HORNED OWL. (375) 
Resident, but not now very common, as a result of indiscriminate and 
senseless persecution to which it has been subjected. 
Carroll County: October 5, 1878, one taken near Camden; on February 
21, 1884, I saw one in a large sycamore tree on Deer Creek east of Camden. 
On March 6, 1885, a very large female was sent to us from Flora by Mr. 
S. W. Barnard. November 4, 1889, a female taken near Burlington by J. M. 
Beck who sent it to us. A male gotten east of Terre Haute, April 27, 1888, by 
Mr. A. H. Kelso, one of my students. Another brought us in the fall of 
1888 by Mr. Ed. Tetzel of Terre Haute, and another about the same time by 
Mr. Frank Byers. A fine female caught in a steel trap near Sullivan, Indi- 
ana, and brought to us December 4, by Hon. Murray Briggs. 
During my boyhood days at Burlington, the Great Horned Owl, Cat Owl, 
or Hoot Owl, was quite common. They frequented the dense woods and 
their whoo, whoo, whoo-hoo, was a familiar sound, most frequent in the 
spring and fall, but often heard in summer and winter. Their presence in 
the deep woods was frequently made known by crows, or jays. These 
species seemed to have no love whatever for the Great Horned Owl. When 
a jay or a crow discovered one of these owls quietly dozing in the thick 
foliage or protection of some tree. it would at once set up a cry which soon 
brought to its assistance all the other jays or crows within a radius of a 
mile or more. They would all, or in turn, fly at the owl, perhaps sometimes 
striking it, and all the time keeping up such a din with their cawing and 
“rough language’ as only crows and jays are capable of. When the owl 
could stand it no longer and attempted to escape by flying away, its tor- 
mentors, especially the crows, would follow it closely, and renew the at- 
tacks when it stopped again. These attacks are sometimes kept up for an 
hour or more. 
That the Great Horned Owl is guilty of occasional forays on the poultry 
yard must be admitted. An owl which has once met with success in its 
visit to the chicken roost is quite apt to repeat the visits at intervals of a 
few days and usually with disastrous results to the poultry. Perhaps 
the most successful method employed by the farmer in meeting these raids 
was by trapping the owl. A tall stout pole was set in the ground in the 
chicken lot. A board was nailed on top of the pole and a set steel trap 
placed on the board. An owl coming to the chicken lot would be quite apt 
to alight on the top of the pole and be caught in the trap. 
While the Great Horned Owl does do some damage to the farmer’s poultry, 
this can be excused when we consider the great good they do in the destruc- 
tion of noxious rodents. 
