I 9 i8 THE OWLS 



time, particularly on a bright sunny day, the long-eared owl will allow itself to be 

 closely approached, and on discovering the intruder will try to make itself look 

 slender and long by pressing the feathers, which are usually somewhat puffed out, 

 close to the body, and sitting very erect and still. It might in such a position very 

 readily be mistaken for a part of the limb on which it may be sitting. Occasionally, 

 while on the ground, for instance, and being suddenly disturbed at a meal, they 

 throw themselves into quite a different attitude one of defiance, making them- 

 selves look much larger than they really are, and presenting a fierce and formidable 

 front. I nearly stepped on one of them once while it was busily engaged in killing 

 a ground squirrel, which it had evidently just caught. The owl was sitting by the 

 side of a fallen pine tree, and as I stepped over it my foot was placed within twelve 

 inches of the bird. All at once she seemed to expand to several times her normal 

 size; every feather raised and stood at a right angle to the body; the wings were 

 fully spread, thrown up, and obliquely backward, their outer edges touching each 

 other over and behind the head, which likewise looked abnormally large; and this 

 sudden change in appearance, combined with the hissing noise she uttered, made it 

 appear a very formidable object at first sight." 



The Jamaica long-eared owl (A. grammicus} differs from all the other repre- 

 sentatives of the genus in that the number of light bands on the quills is ten, there 

 being also about the same number on the tail feathers. It is also distinguished by 

 the toes being completely bare, although it is approached in this respect by the 

 Stygian owl (A. stygius) of Brazil. 



The pygmy owls, few of which exceed eight inches in length, while 

 several are less than six, bring us to the first representatives of the 

 second subfamily of the Bubonida, which includes all the remaining members of 

 the order. The group is characterized by the ear tube being not larger than the 

 eye, and unprovided with an operculum, and also by the facial disc being unequal, 

 and in some cases very imperfectly developed, the portion below the eye being 

 always much larger than that above the same. The latter difference may be seen 

 by comparing the figure of the Ural owl on p. 1912 with that of the little owl on p. 

 1923. The pygmy owls, of which the common species (Glattddium passerinum) is 

 represented on the right side of the illustration on p. 1909, in addition to their 

 small size, may be distinguished by the absence of ear tufts, the inflated and swollen 

 cere, in which are pierced the nostrils, by the first primary of the wing being short, 

 the whole wing short and rounded, the tail also rounded, and more than half the 

 length of the wing, and the metatarsus of moderate length, and densely feathered. 

 There is not unfrequently some confusion between the members of this genus and the 

 little owls of the genus Carine, but if it be remembered that while in the former the 

 first primary is short, in the latter it is long, the difficulty will vanish. There are 

 some twenty species of pygmy owls, ranging over the greater part of the Old World, 

 but not found eastward of the Malay islands; and also occurring in Southern North 

 America and the whole of South America. For their size these little owls are bold 

 and rapacious, many of them flying at birds of larger bulk than themselves. Usu- 

 ally nocturnal, and hunting in the morning and evening, they may at times be seen 

 abroad in daylight. Mice, voles, lemmings, small birds, and large insects form 



