THE AMERICAN BARN OWL. 
(Strix pratincola). 
LYNDS JONES. 
OUR barn owl belongs to the trop- 
ical and warm temperate genus 
Strix, which is scattered widely- 
over the greater part of the 
earth in the tropical and subtropical 
parts of both hemispheres, and scatter- 
ingly into the temperate zones. In 
Europe one species is common as far 
north as the British Isles, while our own 
bird is found as far north as southern 
New England in the East, Ontario, 
Michigan, Wisconsin, and southern 
Minnesota in the interior, and Oregon 
and Washington on the Pacific coast. 
It is hardly common anywhere except 
in the extreme southwestern part of 
the United States, where it is the most 
abundant owl in California. It is rare 
or casual north of about the fortieth 
parallel. But two specimens have been 
brought to the Oberlin College Museum 
in twenty years, one of which was 
found dead in a barn a mile east of 
Oberlin in December of 1898. 
The barn owl is the most nocturnal 
of all our owls, although he can see 
perfectly in the brightest day. Not 
until twilight does he issue from his 
secure hiding-place to do battle with 
the farm and orchard pests. Then he 
may be seen sailing noiselessly over 
orchard and meadow in quest of any 
mischievous rodent that may be men- 
acing the farmer's prospects. He 
seems to single out intelligently the 
ones that do the most injury, destroy- 
ing large numbers of pouched gophers 
and other annoying and destructive 
creatures, asking only in return to be 
left in peace in his hiding-place. The 
farmer certainly has no better friend 
than this owl, for he destroys poultry 
only when driven to it by the direst 
necessity. In the East, his food con- 
sists largely of rats and mice; in some 
parts of the South the cotton rat is the 
chief diet; while in the West he feeds 
principally upon the gopher {Thomomys 
talpoides bulbivorus) and the California 
ground squirrel {Spermophilus grammu- 
rus beecheyi), according to Prof. B. W. 
Evermann. It seems pretty certain 
that fish are sometimes captured and 
eaten. 
This owl undoubtedly breeds, though 
sparingly, in all suitable localities 
wherever it is found, and probably 
migrates more or less in the northern 
part of its range. In Europe it nests 
in old ruins, towers, and abutments of 
bridges, but our American species 
finds few such places, so he resorts to 
hollow trees, caves, crevices in rocks, 
and banks, and even to burrows in the 
level ground, as we find to be the case 
in parts of the West. The burrows are 
undoubtedly the deserted burrows of 
some other animal. In the eastern 
parts of the country the owls frequently 
nest in buildings. It is well known 
that a pair occupied one of the towers 
of the Smithsonian building in the city 
of Washington in 1890, raising a brood 
of seven young. It is stated that the 
period of incubation is from three to 
three and a half weeks, and that brood- 
ing begins with the deposit of the first 
egg; thus there may be fresh eggs and 
young in the same nest. This accounts 
for the long period of incubation. 
The eggs are pure white, usually 
from four to seven in number, rarely 
twelve. They are rather longer in pro- 
portion than those of the other owls — 
in about the proportion of 1.30x1.70. 
But the average size is variously given 
by the various authors. 
It seems a little curious that there 
should be such a marked difference be- 
tween the hawks and owls as regards 
nest material. They belong to the 
same order of birds, and yet the hawks 
build their own nests, collecting the 
material and arranging it much after 
the fashion of higher birds, while the owls 
make practically no nest, at the most 
collecting a little material and scatter- 
ing it about with little regard for ar- 
rangement. But the difficulty disap- 
pears when we realize that the owls 
have probably always nested in hollows 
which require no nest material, while 
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