248 BUBONHXE BUBO 



Key of the Species. 



A. Bill black ; above, black or brown spotted with 



ochre and white. 



a. Larger, wing 14' 15 ; ear-coverts greyish with 

 a few darker shaft marks, not transversely 

 banded B. capensis, p. 248. 



6. Smaller, wing 12'13 ; ear-coverts greyish trans- 

 versely barred with black B. maculosus, p. 249. 



B. Bill pale ashy-horn ; large, wing 17'18 ; above, 



brown vermiculated with white B. lacteus, p. 252, 



496. Bubo capensis. Cape Eagle Owl. 



Bubo capensis, Smith, S. Afr. Quart. Journ. ii, p. 317 (1834) ; id. 

 Illustr. Zool. S. Afr. Aves, pi. 70 (1842) ; Layard, B. S. Afr. p. 39 

 (1867) ; id. Ibis, 1869, p. 71 [Buffelsjagts river] ; Sharpe, ed. 

 Layard's B. S. Afr. pp. 70, 801 (1875) ; id. Cat. B. M. ii, p. 27 

 (1875) ; Butler, Feilden, and Reid, Zool. 1882, p. 204 [Newcastle] ; 

 Shelley, B. Afr. i, p. 143 (1896) ; Woodward Bros. Natal B. p. 156 

 (1899) ; Reichenow, Vog. Afr. i, p. 653 (1901). 



Description. Adult female. Above, brown spotted and mottled 

 with orange-tawny, wing-coverts with white spots as well ; quills 

 brown with transverse bands of tawny which become almost white 

 on the inner webs ; tail also banded dark brown and tawny ; facial 

 disc white with black shafts to the decomposed feathers, ear-coverts 

 darker, but never transversely banded, bounded on either side by a 

 strongly-marked black band and below by a row of tawny feathers 

 centrally streaked with black ; a white spot of soft downy feathers 

 on the upper breast ; rest of the lower surface mottled with black, 

 white, and tawny, the distribution becoming bandlike on the flanks ; 

 legs, which are feathered to the claws, pale fulvous to white 

 and not mottled or spotted ; under tail-coverts white and a few 

 bars of dark brown, a large and conspicuous corn about I/O long at 

 the base of the tarso-metatarsus. 



Iris orange-yellow ; bill and cere black ; claws light horn. 



Length in flesh 19'5 ; wing 14-5 ; tail 7-25 ; tarsus 2-75 ; culmen 

 1-20 ; ear tufts 2-40. 



Distribution. The Cape Eagle Owl appears to be confined to 

 the southern portion of South Africa. It has not hitherto been met 

 with beyond the limits of tbe Colony and Natal. It is not uncom- 

 mon in the neighbourhood of Cape Town, whence it was first 

 described by Smith ; Layard obtained eggs on the Berg river ; 



