WHITE, OR BARN OWL. 135 



They feed on young rats, mice, shrews, small birds, insects, 

 &c. parts of all of which have been recognized at different 

 times on examination of the rejected pellets, which are 

 generally to be found in abundance near any favourite 

 place of their resort. That the Barn Owl will sometimes 

 capture fish is proved by a note in the Compendium of the 

 Ornithology of Great Britain by the late Mr. John Atkin- 

 son of Leeds, which states that a gentleman residing in 

 Yorkshire, and well acquainted with ornithology, having 

 observed the scales of fishes in the nest of a pair, which 

 had built near a lake on his premises, he was induced one 

 moonlight night to watch their motions, when he was 

 agreeably surprised to see one of them plunge into the 

 water, and seize a perch, which it bore to its nest, whence 

 the gentleman took it. This note, it appears, was supplied 

 by Mr. Waterton of Walton Hall, in whom the Barn Owl 

 has found a most able and philanthropic advocate.* 



It is said of this Owl, that when satisfied it will hide the 

 remainder of its meat, like a dog. 



The Barn Owl lays from three to five eggs, which are 

 oval and white, measuring one inch six lines in length, and 

 one inch three lines in breadth. Young birds have been 

 found in July, they have also been found in September, 

 and Mr. Waterton, in his paper already referred to, men- 

 tions having found young Owls in the nest so late in the 

 year as December. A short notice by Mr. Blyth in the 

 Field Naturalist's Magazine, vol. i. page 187, serves to ex- 

 plain the circumstance of the occurrence of young Owls 

 over a space of time so unusually long. " A nest of the 

 Barn Owl last summer in this neighbourhood (Tooting) 

 contained two eggs, and when these were hatched two 

 more were laid, which latter were probably hatched by the 



* Magazine of Natural History, vol. v. p. 9. 



