OWL. 317 



Owl; it is oftener found on the ground, among long grass, &c. than 

 on trees, and when disturbed, will, after flying a little way, alight 

 again among the grass ; in this situation is supposed to searcli 

 after reptiles for food, as also mice, and in some places, which have 

 been infested with the latter, the Owls have collected in large troops, 

 and attacked those depredators to their utter extirpation.* This 

 species will also occasionally attack small birds, and has itself been 

 taken in a net set for larks, and in the act of making a pounce at 

 the decoy bird. We once found in the stomach of one, three legs of 

 thrushes, besides a quantity of feathers. Those which we see here, 

 are supposed by some to breed in the Orknies, and more probably in 

 Norway ; said to make the nest on the ground ; is a very fierce bird ; 

 one having been shot in Derbyshire in the wing, would not suffer 

 itself to be taken up, as it darted at the person with surprising fury, 

 and was obliged to be killed before it could be secured. 



Is called at Gibraltar the Heath Owl, as it is tbund in abundance 

 in the commons and heaths about the Isthmus there ; very numerous 

 in the woods of Siberia, where it comes blindly to the night fires, 

 and assaults men, so as often to be knocked down with sticks. 



Inhabits America ; visits Hudson's Bay in May ; makes a ne^t 

 of dry grass on the ground ; the eggs are white ; departs southward 

 in September ; called there the Mouse Hawk and Hawk Owl, by the 

 Natives, Thothosecausew. 



I once received a specimen from Hudson's Bay, under the name 



* A remark of this kind is mentioned by Dale — " In the year 1580, at Hallowntide, an 

 army of mice so over run the marshes near South Minster, that they eat up the grass to the 

 very roots; but at length a great number of strange painted Owls came, and devoured all the 

 mice. The like happened in Essex in 1648.— Dale Harivkh App. p. -307. Note 2. Col. 

 Montagu mentions a similar instance at Bridgewater ; in the neighbourhood of which, mice 

 were in such abundance, a few years since, as to destroy a large portion of vegetation, and in 

 the autumn a great many of the Short-eared Owls resorted to that part, in order to prey on 

 them. — Om. Diet. Sup. Mr. Bewick informs us, that 28 have been found in a turnip field in 

 November, probably attracted thereto by mice. 



