“64 BRITISH BIRDS, WITH THEIR NESTS AND EGGs 
with feathers and down; sometimes the old drey of a squirrel is chosen. The 
eggs are white, slightly glossy, and are elliptical in shape, and of about the 
same size as those of the Barn-Owl, and are usually four in number, but as 
many as seven have been met with, and, as in the case of the Barn-Owl, 
both young birds and eggs are found in the same nest. The nestlings are 
at first covered with light yellowish-grey down, barred with faint brown, and 
have two conspicuous tufts in their head even at this early stage. When they 
are fully fledged they sit out side by side together upon a branch, and form 
a pretty sight. The family may keep together longer than the young of other 
Owls are permitted to associate with the parents, for the writer once in the 
autumn met with a keeper who having just seen a single Long-eared Owl 
perched upon the top of a bank fired at it, and found that he had killed five 
of these Owls that had been all squatting very closely together. He had all 
five birds with him, and the writer selected two of them that were in very 
fine plumage to skin for his collection. 
The flight of the Long-eared Owl is very light and buoyant, owing to 
its long wings, which extend beyond the tail when closed, and it seems to 
resemble the Harriers more than any other of the Owls. It is dispersed all 
over Europe, except in the extreme north, and is also found throughout Central 
Asia, and is a winter visitor to the North of Africa. It is represented in 
America by a closely allied sub-species, Ofus IT i/sonianus, which appears to be 
sociable at the nesting season. Dr. Coues speaks of a thicket of pines which 
in the dreary winter months was a great place of rendezvous of the American 
Long-eared Owl, and where, in the spring-time, the females deposited their eggs 
in rude and unsightly nests of their own construction. The numbers were 
prodigious, so that there were very few of the trees, if any, without two or more 
nests. ‘‘The many fragments of the bones of mammals and birds, and the other 
remains of the same that laid in piles upon the ground, bore testimony to the 
wholesale destruction of life that was carried on.” The cry of the Long-eared 
Owl is said by Dresser to be a deep hoot, others state that it utters a note like 
the barking of a spaniel, while the young birds make a noise somewhat similar 
to the mewing of a young kitten that may be heard at a great distance. The 
writer is disposed to doubt this Owl’s ever hooting; a long cat-like wail, or 
scream, proceeding from his fir plantations at night was by him believed to be 
the cry of Aszo otus. 
The plumage of the Long-eared Owl is full and soft, and is very elegant in 
its coloration. Upon the head are two tufts of about seven dark brown feathers 
edged with yellow that project about one-and-a-half inch; the upper parts are 
