•134 Staten Island Association of Arts and Sciences 



least a dozen, on Staten Island, where these interesting birds 

 nest with more or less regularity. What interferes with them 

 most, as long as they are not shot, is the destruction of the 

 woods, now going on so rapidly in many places. 



.Barn Owls, Aluco pratincola. 



Our first visit this year to the barn owls' nest at New Dorp 

 was on April 19. Two owls were in the coop, where seven eggs 

 had been laid, without even an apology for a nest, on the rubbish 

 covering the floor. Alongside the eggs lay a freshly killed 

 meadow mouse, Microtus pennsylvanicus. 



My next inspection was on May 5, very late in the afternoon. 

 One young bird had appeared, and it set up a vigorous peeping 

 as soon as it was deserted by its parent, while in one of the six 

 unhatched eggs I could hear a similar note produced by another 

 young owl within. On May 10 Mr. Howard Cleaves paid them 

 a visit. Something had evidently happened to the first two 

 young birds that hatched, for he found only four eggs, and one 

 very newly hatched owlet. 



Mr. Taylor, who was now in charge of the barn, would not let 

 us go up inside when we came on June 21, but Mr. Cleaves 

 climbed up on the outside of the pigeon coop, and scared out one 

 •old owl, while he could also hear the hissing of the young birds in 

 the coop. Just outside the entrance lay an addled egg, which 

 the owls had apparently tried to dispose of, and some meadow 

 lark feathers. From the remains of birds occasionally found 

 around this nest, it is shown that even this specise of owl cannot 

 he said to feed exclusively on small mammals. 



From time to time I have heard of white owls that had been 

 seen or shot about buildings on Staten Island, and some of them 

 must have been barn owls. Several years ago one is said to 

 have been killed at a burning barn near Rossville. This par- 

 ticular individual is reported to have been " stuffed," but I have 

 not as yet been able to locate its remains. 



On May 30, 1908, Mr. Thomas Flynn pointed out to me an old 



