VERMIN 135 



mice both the vole and the long-tailed field-mouse 

 are included in the owl's bill of fare, 



The tawny owl has also been known to kill full- 

 grown pheasants. In a large open pheasantry at In- 

 veraray, Mr. Cameron, the head- keeper to His Grace 

 the Duke of Argyll, and an observant naturalist, dis- 

 covered that hen pheasants were being killed and eaten 

 by some animal, though he could not at first make out 

 which. He suspected rats, and had traps set to try 

 to secure the depredator, but without success. One 

 morning, however, after a fall of snow, he found another 

 dead pheasant, but the mark of the feathers revealed 

 the fact that owls had been the murderers. He there- 

 fore baited a trap with the partly eaten pheasant, and 

 erected a pole near by, on the top of which he placed a 

 pole-trap. By seven o'clock that night a tawny owl was 

 caught in the pole-trap, and in the morning another was 

 in the baited trap. At the same place a number of ducks 

 were being hand-reared and enclosed by wire-netting, 

 to prevent them straying. The ducklings were fed at 

 six o'clock in the morning, and between nine and ten 

 in the forenoon ten of them were missing. Two keepers 

 concealed themselves, and very shortly a hen gave the 

 alarm which made them look out. So stealthily and 

 noiselessly did an owl glide in, that he was not seen or 

 heard till he was in the act of pouncing on a lot of duck- 

 lings which were clustered together, basking in the sun. 

 He was so near his quarry that the keeper could not 

 shoot without killing the ducks, but his sudden move- 



