42 ANIMAL LIFE IN AFRICA 



It makes a peculiar clucking sound when angry, much 

 resembling the cracking of a hard nut, which it repeats 

 many times. By night it utters a deep hoot, but has also 

 another cry, which I have heard it make in the early 

 morning from its tree ; this is a very shrill and penetrating 

 whistle or screech, which can be heard a long way off. 



I once found a young bird, nearly full grown, but still 

 unable to fly, hidden away in the fork of a large tree 

 about eight feet from the ground. About dusk its mother 

 arrived, and I brought her down with a charge of shot 

 apparently dead. She was carried into camp by the 

 legs, and thrown into a corner to be skinned in the 

 morning. When morning came she had disappeared, 

 and after a long search was discovered under a bush 

 about fifty yards away. She was still to all appearance 

 dead, and during the march that day was carried in a 

 basket on a " boy's " back, quite limp and motionless. 

 That night she again disappeared and was found under 

 the same conditions as before. I now began to suspect 

 that she was not quite so severely injured as I had believed, 

 and could in fact discover no damage except to one of the 

 wings. The following night some raw meat left beside 

 her had vanished, and two days after arrival at my station 

 she abandoned her artifice, ate everything that was 

 given to her, and, like her offspring, soon became very 

 tame. Both these birds have been in the Zoological 

 Gardens at Pretoria for the last four years. I never 

 knew an animal sham dead longer and more naturally. 



As a set-off to the damage which they do to small 

 game, there is no doubt that these owls also eat con- 

 siderable numbers of locusts and other insects and 

 reptiles, including snakes. A large one will measure 

 some three feet across the wings, and their bodies are 

 broad and bulky. 



