7mo ago

Long Eared Owl

Alongside the tawny owl, long-eared owls are the most common owls in Central Europe.
Their plumage and the tufts of feathers on their heads make them look like small eagle owls, but they are of course a species of owl in their own right.
They begin courting in January and February, and after the eggs have been laid, only the females look after the brood. The males bring food and only later look after the larger young.
Owls cannot build their own nests; they take over nests of crows or magpies from the previous year to raise their young. They therefore have to look for suitable breeding sites early in the year, before they are occupied by other birds.

4 comments

Love the orange eyes. The article is interesting too. Some highlights:
Each owl eats about 40 pounds of mice per year.
They like to take a shower when it rains. You can see that here.
The babies have different voices, higher or lower, so you can tell them apart. Example here (click on "juvenile calls")
When they find an empty nest and there's a fight about who owns it, the winner is usually whoever lays the first egg.
But sometimes two different kinds of birds lay eggs in the same nest. There's been at least one time where a couple of sparrowhawks successfully raised a long-eared owl chick.
They enjoy the company of other long-eared owls. In the winter, owls from an entire region sometimes sleep in the same tree.
- That owl shower video was cute. The usual owl bath vids I see are ones in treatment. It was nice seeing some wild ones enjoying the weather.
  Post on owl "language"
  I wish they had a source on the shared nesting. I did a post a while back about a Red Tailed Hawk in a Bald Eagle nest. The reading said that it isn't super uncommon, but it is generally not very successful in the long run. I would have liked to see a story where it was successful.
  I still haven't gotten to do it yet, but I found a story of a town that gets overrun with Long Eared Owls regularly, where there can be 100+ of them in a single tree. I haven't been feeling the best lately still, and I want to do a really good job on that story so I've kept it on hold until I can give it better attention because I think it will be very fun to write about and find photos of. it
  
  I tried to find a source too, and couldn't. I feel like my Google-fu might not be up to par today, but some things are just hard to find.
  I read the article about the spunky hawk that survived in an eagle's nest. Interesting story, and well written :)
  The voice matching game is fun. The voices are pretty distinctive, but I had trouble remembering the squares at first. Turns out, when you close your eyes to listen to the sound, it gets a teeny bit harder to remember the square. Lol.