I 9 I 3" I 9 I 4-] A Pair of Long- Eared Owls. yi 



evening during this period in 1910. There were, of course, 

 variations ; no two nights, when we watched the pair, was 

 their conduct precisely identical ; but in principle, if not in 

 detail, the awakening process in that year was the same right 

 up to April 25, which was only four days before the first egg 

 was laid. 



The hour of wakening, or rather the hour when the first 

 whee or oo was heard, varied less than any other feature — 

 the earliest record being twenty-two minutes after sunset, and 

 the latest thirty-three minutes after sunset, so that they rose, 

 as a rule, rather later than the Tawny Owl. The amount of 

 time spent in calling was much more inconstant, but it was 

 nearly always broken by a spell of silence when, as I have 

 suggested, preening operations probably took place. The 

 female was usually the more persistent speaker and the last 

 to take wing. They did not always fly straight out of the 

 wood. The male, particularly, frequently indulged in wing- 

 clapping gyrations among the trees, and even betook himself 

 to a new perch before finally departing. This wing-clapping 

 antic resembles the well-known flight-play of the Wood- 

 pigeon, and probably has the same sexual significance. It 

 is performed, as I have described, by both sexes of the Long- 

 eared Owl, and seems to differ from the Wood-pigeon's method 

 in the wing contact being below and not above the body. 



One episode in 1910 is probably worthy of special remark. 

 On April 8, about six weeks after the arrival of the Owls 

 in the Corner, the female, after leaving her roosting perch, 

 flew into a thick mass of honeysuckle which festooned the 

 bole of an old oak-tree, and remained hidden there for some 

 time. We did not understand this visit at the time, but 

 in the light of later knowledge we may well ask the ques- 

 tion, Was she considering the possibilities of the honeysuckle 

 as a nesting site ? If so, her considerations came to naught, 

 as she ultimately nested elsewhere ; but it is rather strange, in 

 view of what happened in 1911, that this solitary visit to the 

 honeysuckled oak was the only sign of nest-prospecting we 

 had in 1910! 



In 1911 a very different series of phenomena was presented 

 for our delectation. For the first three weeks the Owls be- 

 haved as in 1910, waking about twenty-five minutes after 



