310 EAGLE-OWL. 
Museum, Dublin, there is an example of the South African Budo 
maculosus, said to have been brought in the flesh to the late Dr. 
Birkett of Waterford on January 27th 1851 (probably an imported 
bird), and at one time this specimen was erroneously identified as 
the American 2B. virginianus. 
The Eagle-Owl inhabits the forest-covered, rugged and mountain- 
ous districts of Europe, from Scandinavia, Lapland and Northern 
Russia to the Mediterranean ; as well as Africa north of the Atlas 
Mountains. Specimens from beyond the Volga are pale in colour, 
while east of the Ural Mountains and across Siberia to the Sea of 
Okhotsk a still paler form, B. sébivicus, occurs; but birds from 
China to the Sea of Japan seem to be identical with those from 
Europe. In Central Asia, through the Himalayas to Tibet, its 
representative is the rather smaller B. turcomanus ; while B. dblakis- 
font is the species found in Japan ; and B. ascalaphus (with shorter 
ear-tufts) inhabits Syria, Egypt and North-east Africa. America is 
occupied by 2B. wirginianus and its sub-divisions. 
In the forest-regions the Eagle-Owl deposits its eggs in some 
wide fork or other convenient place in a large tree, or makes use of 
an old nest of another bird; but in the mountains it selects ruins, 
slightly overhung ledges, or the roots of trees on crags, and the 
sides of narrow gorges, while it is not averse to the proximity of a 
cottage; and in the steppes it lays its eggs on the open ground. 
Incubation often commences early in April; the 2-3 nearly round 
eggs being creamy-white: measurements 2°3 by 1°9 in. No nest is 
originally made, but the young are often found upon an accumula- 
tion of castings, mingled with fur from rats, rabbits, hares, &c., 
which, with birds, form the food of this predatory species. In 
Spain and the Pyrenees the peasants make a practice of robbing the 
nest of the game supplied daily to the young by the parent birds, 
and substituting any available offal; for which reason the position is 
seldom revealed to strangers until the young are nearly ready to fly. 
The Eagle-Owl seeks its prey by day as well as by night; its cry, 
chiefly uttered early in the spring, is a loud 400, 400. In confinement 
this species breeds freely and has been known to live to a great age. 
The general colour of the upper parts is dark brown or black, 
mottled with tawny-yellow; wings and tail transversely barred ; 
under parts yellowish-brown with dark streaks and bars ; head with 
long ear-tufts ; operculum absent ; legs thickly feathered to the toes ; 
irides bright orange. Length: male 24 in., wing 18 in.; female 
25 in., wing 18°5 in. Northern examples are larger than those from 
the south. 
