Note 1 — Chapter XVI · OTHER OWLS

“If the fields prove disappointing as a hunting-ground, the owl makes bold to approach dwelling-houses and finds its way into barns, there to play the part of cat and thus make good the title of ‘hooting cat’ which has been given it. For patience and skill in catching rats and mice it rivals Raminagrobis1 himself. It is a guest to be treated with respect when hunger compels it to visit our granaries. After completing its nightly rounds it returns to the woods early in the morning, hides in the densest thickets or in the trees having the most abundant foliage, and there passes the day silent and motionless. In winter its home is always in the hollow of some old tree trunk. It lays its eggs in the abandoned nests of magpies, crows, buzzards, and kestrels; and these eggs, of a dingy gray color, are about as large as a pullet’s, but nearly round.