THE SHORT-EARED OWL 145 



Ing this species in its native haunts, says that it does not confine 

 its flight entirely to the darker hours, as he has met with it in the woods 

 saiUng quickly along, as if hawking, on a bright summer day. It is 

 curious to observe, he says, how flat they invariably make their nests, 

 so much so, that it is diificult to conceive how the eggs retain their 

 position, even in a slight wind, when the parent bird leaves them. 

 The eggs are four to six in number, and there are grounds for 

 supposing that the female bird begins to sit as soon as she has laid 

 her first egg. 



THE SHORT-EARED OWL 



ASIO ACCIPITRfNUS 



Face whitish ; beak black ; iris yellow ; egrets inconspicuous, of a few black 

 feathers ; eyes encircled by brownish black ; upper plumage dusky 

 brown, edged with yellow ; lower pale orange, streaked with brown. 

 Length sixteen inches ; breadth thirty-eight. Eggs white. 



From the name, Hawk-Owl, sometimes given to this species, we 

 should expect to find this bird not so decidedly nocturnal in its 

 habits as the preceding ; and such is the case ; for, though it does 

 not habitually hunt by day, it has been known to catch up chickens 

 from the farmyard, and has been seen in chase of pigeons. If attacked 

 during daylight, it does not evince the powerless dismay of the last 

 species, but effects a masterly retreat by soaring in a spiral direction 

 until it has attained an elevation to which its adversary does not 

 care to follow it. Unhke its allies, it frequents neither mountains 

 nor forests, but is found breeding in a few marshy or moorland 

 districts ; later in the year it is met with in turnip fields and 

 stubbles. As many as twenty-eight were once seen in a single 

 turnip-field in England ; from whence it has been inferred that in 

 autumn the Short-eared Owls are gregarious, and establish them- 

 selves for a time in any place they fall in with, where field-mice or 

 other small quadrupeds are abundant. In England this bird is not 

 uncommonly started by sportsmen when in pursuit of game. It 

 then flies with a quick zig-zag motion for about a hundred yards, 

 and alights on the ground, never on a tree. By some it is called 

 the Woodcock-Owl, from its arriving and departing at about the 

 same time with that bird ; it is not, however, invariably a bird of 

 passage, since many instances are on record of its breeding in this 

 country, making a rude nest in a thick bush, either on the ground, 

 or close to it, and feeding its young on mice, small birds, and even 

 the larger game, as Moor-fowl, a bird more than double its own 

 weight. The Short-eared Owl affords a beautiful illustration of 

 a fact not generally known, that the nocturnal birds of prey have 

 the right and left ear differently formed, one ear being so made as 

 to hear sounds from above, and the other from below. The opening 



B.B, I. 



