PLATE II 

 SHORT-EARED OWL. Asio accipitrinus 



May 1899. Hickling. The young Owl whose portrait is given in the Plate 

 was found by a marshman, who sent word to me at once to come and photo- 

 graph it. It crouched flat on the ground, and gazed at us with its great 

 yellow eyes, but made no attempt to fly away, until one of the men stooped 

 to touch it, when it rose and flapped lazily away for fifty or sixty yards and 

 alighted again. 



I was taken to see another ' Mesh Owl's ' nest in the afternoon. It was 

 placed among some rushes near one of the 'dykes,' and had been found by 

 the man who was cutting reeds there. As dusk came on we saw several pairs 

 of Owls flying lazily about, high in the air. Their flight is most peculiar, 

 and rather difficult to describe : the wings are held very straight and stiff, and 

 the bird progresses with sharp strokes of its wings, with a curious interval 

 between each beat, often soaring for a moment or two, and sometimes wheeling 

 in great circles. 



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