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Short-eared Owl

Short-eared Owl

Asio flammeus

Identify the Short-eared Owl by sound or photo and log your sightings with Birdpass.

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The Short-eared Owl is a widespread owl of open country – grassland, bog, meadow and tundra – found on every continent except Antarctica and Australia. Named for its tiny ear tufts, it hunts low over open ground with a buoyant, moth-like flight and is often active by day. It is partly migratory and highly nomadic, following vole booms.

Did you know?

  • It is one of the few owls that routinely hunt in daylight.
  • When nesting on the ground it may lure predators away by pretending to have a broken wing.

Voice

Sound

About the species

Identification

A pale owl of open country with yellow eyes accentuated by black eye patches. It resembles Long-eared Owl but is paler; the underwing has narrow dark tips and a clear white trailing edge. The breast is streaked, but the belly is fairly plain; the underwings are clearly paler than the upperwings.

Family

Strigidae

Size

Large (crow)

Colours

brown, orange, black, white

About the habitat

Open habitats such as bogs and mires, coastal meadows, grassland, heath, hayfields and farmland; also tundra and dunes.

Diet

Mainly voles and other small mammals; also small birds, particularly near coasts, and large insects.

Behaviour

Often hunts in daylight, coursing low over open ground with irregular, flexible wingbeats. In the breeding season the male performs display flights with wing-clapping. It nests on the ground in a simple scrape hidden in low vegetation; clutches are larger in good vole years. The female incubates for about four weeks; the chicks leave the nest at about two weeks and fly at four weeks. Adults may feign injury to lure predators away.

Sources

Photo: Sumeet Moghe, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Short Eared Owl on the Ground.jpg

Sound: Sonothèque ADVL, XC1080062, CC0 1.0 https://xeno-canto.org/1080062

Text: Wikipedia (English) + FinBIF species descriptions + Wikipedia (Finnish), CC BY-SA 4.0; FinBIF: CC BY 4.0; Wikipedia: CC BY-SA 4.0 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short-eared_owl

See also