144 BIRDS OF THE PLAINS 



able result of bolting a victim whole. One vice, alas ! 

 leads to another. 



Kingfishers, which swallow whole fish, likewise eject 

 the bones. This habit of the owl has enabled zoologists 

 to disprove the contention of the gamekeeper that the 

 barn owl lives chiefly upon young pheasants, The 

 bones found in these pellets are nearly all those of 

 small rodents. 



The screech owl, as its name implies, is not a great 

 songster. It hisses, snores, and utters, during flight, 

 blood-curdling screams, which doubtless account for 

 its evil reputation. It lays roundish white eggs in a 

 hole in a tree or other convenient cavity. Three, four, 

 or six are laid, according to taste. I have never found 

 the eggs in India, but they are, in England at any rate, 

 laid, not in rapid succession, but at considerable intervals, 

 so that one may find, side by side in a nest, eggs and 

 young birds of various ages. I do not know whether 

 the owl derives any benefit from this curious habit. 

 It has been suggested that the wily creature makes the 

 first nestling which hatches out do some of the incu- 

 bating. Pranks of this kind are all very well when the 

 nest is hidden away in a hole; they would not do in 

 an open nest to which crows and other birds of that 

 feather have access. 



