246 



GREA'J^ HORNED OWL. 



l)Ubo vii'giiiianiis. 



DESCRIPTION. 



Length (female) 21 to 24 inches; extent about 5 feet; tail about 

 9 inches; male 19 to 23 long; extent about 50 to 53 inches; can 

 be distinguished by its large size and long ear tufts; plumage 

 blackish, brownish, dusky, graying and whitish in mixture: 

 throat and middle of breast white; eyes yellow; bill and claws 

 blackish. 



Habitat. — P^astern North America, west to the Mississippi 

 valley, and from Labrador to Costa Rica. Resident in Penn- 

 sylvania. 



This well-kuown and latlier common inhabitant of 

 the forests can easily be i'ecO'j;ni/(Ml bv its biijic si/.c. 

 the conspicuons white feathers of the throat and the 

 long-ear tufts whieli measure two and one-half inches 

 or more in length. 



THE NEST AND EGGS. 



The Great Horned, the largest of all our native owls. 

 is the first to commence nesting. I have found its 

 eggs in February, and am told that it occasionally 

 lays in January. In this locality the Great Horned 

 Owl seldom breeds in hollow trees; sometimes 

 it constructs a rude and bulky nest of sticks, 

 lined with grasses and feathers, on tlie large horizontal 

 limbs of trees in its favorite wooded retreats. Its eggs, 

 measuring about t^vo and one-fourth inches in length 

 by two inches in width are mostly deposited in the de 

 s(U'ted nests of hawks and cro'ws. Although it is 

 stated by dflTerent writers that this species lays four 

 or more eggs, I have never found, in seven nests exam 

 ined, over two eggs or a like u umber of yoiing. Air. 

 Thomas H. Jackson, of W'csl Clicster, Pa., writing in 

 the Ornithologist :iiul Ool(><>ist. June. ISS(», savs: In 



