CLARKE: THE BIRDS OF YORKSHIRE. 4^ 



A CCIPITRES. S TRIGIDM. 



STRIX ALUCO L. 

 Tawny Owl. 



A generally distributed resident. 



This bird, perhaps the most abundant of the Yorkshire 

 Strigidae, is to be found in those portions of the county where 

 there are woods, or small though dense fir plantations. It is 

 included as a resident in most of the reports sent to me from 

 various parts of the county, and whilst it seems to be especially 

 abundant in the Cleveland district and the neighborhood of 

 Slingsby, it is mentioned as being only of occasional occurrence 

 in the Halifax and Keighley districts and is rare around Sheffield 

 and Huddersfield. Most of the reports mention it as gradually 

 diminishing in numbers, and express regret that so truly useful a 

 species should be subject to persecution. 



This owl nests in a variety of situations; the deserted nest of 

 a crow or magpie being perhaps the most generally selected, 

 whilst hollow trees and ivy are not uncommonly resorted to. 

 Mention is made of a hole in a quarry being used near Scar- 

 borough, in which was found one young bird, one egg and two 

 dead rabbits. I have myself found the eggs of this species laid 

 in a depression in the hay in a barn. Mr. James Carter of 

 Masham informs me that he found on the 17th of March, 1877, 

 five eggs in a nest, a most unusual number. Writing in the 

 Zoologist (1851, p. 159), Mr. S. Hannaford, junr., of Kiveton 

 Park, relates that a pair of these birds kept their young well 

 supplied with young rabbits, which they hung, one at a time, on a 

 branch of a tree near the nest, so as to be within the reach of 

 their young. 



A curious anecdote of a Tawny Owl laying its first egg after 

 being nearly twenty years in captivity is related in the Zoologist 

 (1855, p. 4761) by Mr. Henry Spurr of Scarborough. 



