DELICATE OWL 
169 
with buff, upper surface yellowish brown delicately 
spotted with dark brown and white, and white under 
surface, this Owl is the most beautiful we have. 
Commonly, and not quite correctly, it is called the 
White Owl — a name which certainly serves to dis- 
tinguish it from the dark brown Boobook. 
I have never seen its nest ; but in a patch of gum 
trees on the Torquay Road I once found an inter- 
esting retreat of an Owl of this species. It was 
in a large tree of the kind called, I believe, manna- 
gum ; about 12 feet from the ground there was a 
hollow at the end of a branch, and from this hollow 
the Owl used to fly at our approach. We supposed 
this to be a nest, but examination showed the bough 
to be hollow right down into the trunk of the tree, 
through which there was a passage right to the ground. 
At the foot of this passage, and under the spout 
itself, lay on the ground dozens of the pellets, about 
I inch long and -J- inch wide, ejected by the bird 
after its meals. These all contained bones of small 
birds, amongst which we were able to identify the 
skulls of several Minahs {Myzantha garrula). When- 
ever the Owl flew from the nest there was a great 
clamour among the Minahs, who flew about the Owl, 
in the tree to which it had gone, seemingly not at all 
afraid of it by day, but desirous only to annoy their 
enemy. We concluded that the Owl seized the 
Minahs by night, when the latter were asleep in the 
gum branches. 
Except when thus driven from its retreat, I never 
