Harris — Birds of the Kansas City Region. 267 



in orchards and open timbered places. It builds in hollow 

 trees, barns, belfreys and similar places. 



Family Steigidae. Horned Owls, etc. 



Asio WILSONIANUS (Lcsson). Long eared Owl. 



Uncommon summer resident; common migrant and winter resident. 



The Long-eared Owl occurs chiefly in the timbered bottoms, 

 both in winter and during the breeding season. Small flocks 

 have often been seen there in late autumn and winter; Bush 

 reports one flock of sixty birds wintering near Courtney. A 

 flock of about thirty are found nearly every winter in the large 

 stand of eottonwood timber across from the mouth of the Big 

 Blue. 



Long-eared Owls begin laying their five or six eggs early in 

 March and often refit and reline with feathers for their own 

 use, old nests of crows and squirrels. 



Asio fijAmmeus (Pontoppidan). Short-eared Owl. 



Fairly common migrant; irregular winter resident; very rare sum- 

 mer resident. 



The Short-eared Owl arrives from the north in early or mid- 

 dle October and leaves in March. During open winters when 

 the snowfall is light, flocks of from 8 to 10 to 50 or more may 

 be found wintering where suitable grassy or weedy roosting 

 places are near good hunting ground. Such places are com- 

 mon on the high prairie regions where this owl's favorite game 

 abounds, though the open stretches of grassy bottom lands af- 

 ford equally good wintering resorts. A flock of 15 or 20 birds 

 spent the winter of 1916-17 in the neighborhood of 63rd Street 

 west of Broadway, where they roosted in a patch of weeds and 

 high grass within a hundred yards of several houses under con- 

 struction on one side, and a noisy foot-ball field on the other. 

 When flushed from their roosting ground in the high grass, 

 they sail around gracefully like gulls and perch about on fence 

 posts or drop down further on in the grass and sometimes even 

 on the bare ground in plain sight. During these flights they 

 emit a low plaintive cry reminiscent of the Green Heron's note 

 though much less harsh. Several of the stomach pellets col- 

 lected on this roost were sent to the mammalogists of the Na- 

 tional Museum to determine the species of rodent that consti- 



