Alabama, ipi 5. 69 



BARN OWL 



HIS Owl is about seventeen inches in length. Its facial disk 



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 is not circular as in our other owls ; the plumage above is 

 pale yellow, and beneath varying from silky white to pale 

 bright tawny. It is a resident of Mexico, in the southern 

 United States and north to New York, Ohio, Nebraska and Cali- 

 fornia. 



The barn owl, often called monkey-faced owl, is one of the 

 most beneficial of the birds of prey, since it feeds almost exclu- 

 sively on small mammals that injure farm produce, nursery and 

 orchard stock. It hunts principally in the open and consequently 

 secures such mammals as pocket gophers, field mice, common rats, 

 house mice, harvest mice, kangaroo rats and cotton rats. It occa- 

 sionally captures a few birds and insects. At least a half bushel of 

 the remains of pocket gophers have been found in the nesting cavity 

 of a pair of these birds. Remembering that a gopher has been 

 known in a short time to girdle seven apricot trees worth $100 it is 

 hard to overestimate the value of the service of a pair of barn owls. 

 1,247 pellets of the barn owl collected from the Smithsonian towers 

 contained 3,100 skulls of which 3,004, or 97 per cent, were of mam- 

 mals ; 92, or 3 per cent, of birds ; and 4 were of frogs. The bulk con- 

 sisted of 1,987 field mice, 656 house mice and 210 common rats. 

 The birds eaten were mainly sparrows and blackbirds. This valu- 

 able owl should be rigidly protected throughout its entire range. 



— Biological Survey Bulletin. 



1* 



THE OWL 



BLUE-EYED, strange-voiced, sharp-beak'd, ill-omen'd fowl, 

 What are thou? 



— What I ought to be, an owl; 

 But if I'm such a scarecrow in your eye, 

 You're a much greater fright in mine ; — good-bye ! 



