312 Wild Life in Wales 



That the Noctule is, however, not altogether exempt from 

 the attack of feathered enemies, I once proved by taking 

 the skull of one, along with those of several Pipistrelles, 

 from the castings of a Barn Owl, picked up beneath a 

 roosting place of that bird, in a ruined cottage. It had 

 often enough, already, been demonstrated in this way, that 

 Owls frequently prey upon Bats ; but the nocturnal habits of 

 both afford so little opportunity for the study of their ways 

 in a state of nature that it was with peculiar pleasure that I 

 once witnessed an Owl attempt to take a Bat upon the wing. 

 It was in the early dusk of a September evening, and I was 

 standing against a solitary tree growing in the bottom of a 

 valley, one side of which, across the river, was thickly 

 wooded. More than one Tawny Owl was hooting in the 

 wood, and many Bats were flitting round my tree. I was 

 watching these, when an Owl glided from the wood above, 

 on apparently motionless pinions, just as I have often seen 

 a Sparrow-Hawk advance upon its prey, and, descending in 

 a direct line, made a stoop at a Bat within twenty yards of 

 where I stood. Against the clear sky, I was distinctly able 

 to see the legs thrust out to clutch the prey, but the stroke 

 was unsuccessful. The Bat shifted, and turned, but was 

 still being pursued by the Owl when they disappeared from 

 view, and, in the short interval, I saw two more resolute 

 attempts made to seize it. From this it is evident that Owls, 

 sometimes at least, take their prey upon the wing, and even 

 pursue it in the air for some distance, and it is no doubt in 

 this way that many of the Bats, whose remains are found in 

 their excuviae, are taken. Indeed, there seems small proba- 

 bility of Bats often falling into the clutches of an Owl in any 

 other manner ; for, as a rule, they neither sleep, nor breed, 

 in places where it would be possible for so large an enemy 

 to get at them. I have often been puzzled to imagine how 

 it was that they were so frequently captured, and so probably 

 have other naturalists, but here would seem to be the 

 explanation. The only other account of the witnessing of 

 the taking of Bats upon the wing, which I recollect to have 

 read, appeared from the pen of Mr Pryer, a corresponding 

 member of the Zoological Society, and, although both the 



