NOTES FROM NORFOLK AND SUFFOLK. 473 
me. If taken from the nest when young it is easily reared, soon 
becoming very tame. I have kept some four and five years. In 
a state of nature their food consists principally of young birds, 
small mammals, and insects. In confinement, whenever any of 
the above are not easily procurable, I find that raw lean beef is 
a good substitute, of which it soon gets very fond, even preferring 
it to other food. I have occasionally varied its diet with beetles, 
moths, grasshoppers, butterflies, caterpillars, lizards, water- 
newts, and living as well as dead fish, such as minnows and 
small roach. Feathers and fur, as well as bones and other 
refuse, are (as usual with the Raptores) thrown up in pellets of 
an oblong shape. Mr. J. H. Gurney had a pair of these birds in 
confinement, in 1851, that nested, and laid four eggs about the 
middle of May. ‘Two of these they soon broke, but hatched the 
other two early in June. These nestlings did not long survive, 
Mr. Gurney being unable to say how they disappeared ; he is 
inclined to think the old birds devoured them. Although I have 
been the possessor of quite a number of Little Owls at different 
times, and rather successful in obtaining prizes for them as cage 
birds at bird shows, I was never fortunate enough to get them 
to nest until last spring, when a pair hatched and successfully 
reared their young in my aviary. The following are the notes I 
made concerning them :—Harly in the autumn of 1884 I bought 
three pairs of these Owls in immature plumage, and placed them 
in a cage I had formed in a recess in my back garden. I had 
just previously received a nest of three young of Strix otus, one 
of which I sent away for want of room. One of the two remain- 
ing ones came to an untimely end by breaking a leg and wing 
in a fight. The odd bird soon fraternised with the new comers, 
which continued for some time, when the Long-Hared Owl and 
one of the most pugnacious of its companions had a pitched 
battle which resulted in the death of the latter. Soon after two 
of the little owls had a sharp set to, and another victim was 
added to the death-roll. On dissecting the latter I found its 
breast pierced all over; the sharp claws of its antagonist in 
some instances penetrating the breast-bone. I have never kept 
birds that show such pugnacity. Two combatants will often- 
times fasten their claws into each other with such ferociousness 
that even a fall from the branch to the floor of the cage will not 
cause them to loose their hold. In the month of March a pugna- 
