T ° 1 'l91i mi ] Sherman, Nest Life of the Screech Owl. 163 



she sat brooding her young for the first ten or twelve days after 

 which the order was reversed and they stood upon her. Day by 

 day she shrunk more and more from view until only an ear-tuft 

 could be seen, then came a day when nothing could be seen of her, 

 but she did not desert the nestlings in the daytime until May 26, 

 'three days before they left the nest. Those days she probably 

 spent in the box of her mate where she was seen to take refuge when 

 frightened from her nest. 



It was impossible to learn how many of the days the male owl 

 occupied his box, but from the date of the first egg to that upon 

 which the young left the nest, sixty-four days, he was seen there on 

 twenty-seven of them. Sometimes he did not show himself until 

 evening: sometimes an unusual noise about the blind brought him 

 into view. On other days he kept his head out of the hole almost 

 all the time, going to sleep if all were quiet in the blind. When 

 nest duties were not pressing his mate was seen to thrust her head 

 out of her nest, as the holes of the two boxes faced each other many 

 a Romeo and Juliet scene of an owlish character may have been 

 enacted, and winks were exchanged beyond doubt. A few days 

 before they left the nest the owlets began to sit in the hole and 

 there seemed to be little time day or night when the hole was not 

 occupied by one of them. 



The male Screech Owl appears to have been the general pur- 

 veyor for the family. In the first fortnight of incubation there 

 were nine mornings when an excess of food lay beside his mate; 

 of this she rarely ate during the day, but there were times when she 

 did so. On the remaining days of incubation she had food beside 

 her twice, but as soon as the eggs commenced to hatch there was 

 a superabundance provided. An example of this was furnished 

 on April 29 when there lay in store four meadow mice weighing 

 about two-fifths of a pound altogether. This excessive provision 

 lasted only a few days, the supply decreased daily, and none was 

 seen after May 15. Nine o'clock, half past nine, and ten o'clock 

 were hours upon which he was known to have brought food to the 

 nest, eight o'clock in the evening being the earliest time. Twenty 

 minutes before that hour he uttered his first call, after which were 

 two other calls before his claws were heard on the roof overhead 

 followed by continued calling; a sound like the mewing of young 

 "kittens was judged to be the answering voice of his mate. 



