Audubon's Birds/BIRDSVER1_3.BIN/dp/0005/00050.txt

Text File | 1992-08-27 | 10KB | 170 lines

$Unique_ID{BRD00050}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{The Little or Acadian Owl}
$Subject{Striginae; Ulula; Aegolius; acadica; acadicus; Little Owl; Acadian Owl;
Northern Saw-whet Owl}
$Journal{Birds of America:  Volume I}
$Volume{Vol. 1:123-126}
$Family{Striginae}
$Genus{Ulula; Aegolius}
$Species{acadica; acadicus}
$Common_Name{Little Owl; Acadian Owl; Northern Saw-whet Owl}
$Log{
Plate XXXIII*00050p1.scf
Family*00041.txt
Genus*00048.txt
}

       Portions copyright (c) Creative Multimedia Corp., 1990-91, 1992

                       B I R D S   O F   A M E R I C A .

                    By John James Audubon, F. R. SS. L. & E.

                   ------------------------------------------
                                    VOL. I.
                        --------------------------------


                           THE LITTLE OR ACADIAN OWL.
                            [Northern Saw-whet Owl.]


                              ULULA ACADICA, Gmel.
                              [Aegolius acadicus.]


                        PLATE XXXIII.--MALE AND FEMALE.


     This lively and beautiful little Owl is found in almost every portion of
the United States.  I have observed it breeding in Louisiana, Kentucky, and
along our Eastern States, as far as Maine, where, however, it becomes scarce,
being, as it were, replaced by the Tengmalm Owl, which I have seen as far south
as Bangor, in Maine.  It is rare in the lower parts of South Carolina, where
indeed my friend BACHMAN never observed it.
     The Little Owl is known in Massachusetts by the name of the "Saw-whet," the
sound of its love-notes bearing a great resemblance to the noise produced by
filing the teeth of a large saw.  These notes, when coming, as they frequently
do, from the interior of a deep forest, produce a very peculiar effect on the
traveller, who, not being aware of their real nature, expects, as he advances on
his route, to meet with shelter under a saw-mill at no great distance.  Until I
shot the bird in the act, I had myself been more than once deceived in this
manner.  On one particular occasion, while walking near my saw-mill in
Pennsylvania, to see that all was right there, I was much astonished to hear
these sounds issuing from the interior of the grist-mill.  The door having been
locked, I had to go to my miller's house close by, to inquire if any one was at
work in it.  He, however, informed me that the sounds I had heard were merely
the notes of what he called the Screech Owl, whose nest was close by, in a
hollow tree, deserted by the Wood Ducks, a pair of which had been breeding there
for several years in succession.
     I have been thus particular in relating the above circumstance, from a
desire to know if the European Little Owl (Strix passerina) emits the same
curious sounds.  The latter is said by several authors of eminence to lay only
two white eggs, while I know, from my own observation, that ours bag three,
four, or five, and even sometimes six.  The eggs are glossy-white, and of a
short elliptical form, approaching to globular.  It often takes the old nest of
the Common Crow to breed in, and also lays in the hollows of trees a few feet
above the ground.  A nest of our Little Owl, which I found near the city of
Natchez, was placed in the broken stump of a small decayed tree, not more than
four feet from the ground.  I was attracted to it by the snoring notes of the
young, which sounded as if at a considerable elevation; and I was so misled by
them that, had not my dog raised himself to smell at the hole where the brood
lay concealed, I might not have discovered them.  In this instance the number
was five.  It was in the beginning of June, and the little things which were
almost ready to fly, looked exceedingly neat and beautiful.  The Little Owl
breeds more abundantly near the shores of the Atlantic than in the interior of
the country, and is frequent in the swamps of the States of Maryland and New
Jersey, during the whole year.  Wherever I have found the young or the eggs
placed in a hollow tree, they were merely deposited on the rotten particles of
wood; and when in an old Crow's nest, the latter did not appear to have
undergone any repair.
     This species evinces a strong and curious propensity to visit the interior
of our cities.  I have known some caught alive in the Philadelphia Museum, as
well as in that of Baltimore; and, whilst at Cincinnati, I had one brought to me
which had been taken from the edge of a cradle, in which a child lay asleep, to
the no small astonishment of the mother.
     Being quite nocturnal, it shews great uneasiness when disturbed by day, and
flies off in a hurried uncertain manner, throwing itself into the first covert
it meets with, where it is not difficult to catch it, provided the necessary
caution and silence be used.  Towards dusk it becomes full of animation, flies
swiftly, gliding, as it were, over the grounds, like a little spectre, and
pounces on small quadrupeds and birds with the quickness of thought.  Its common
cry at night resembles that of the European Scops Owl, but is more like the dull
sounds of a whistle than that of Owls generally is.
     My friend Mr. T. MACCULLOCH, jun., has favoured me with the following
curious notice respecting this bird.  "In the beginning of April, when the snow
was still lying in large patches in the woods, although it had entirely
disappeared from the clear lands, I went out with my gun one afternoon,
expecting to obtain some of the small birds which remove to the north on the
first approach of spring.  Having wandered about four miles from home without
meeting with any thing worthy of notice, I had almost determined to return, when
my attention was arrested by a sound which at first seemed to me like the faint
tones of a distant bell.  The resemblance was so exceedingly strong that I
believe the mistake would not have been detected, had not a slight variation in
it induced me to listen more attentively, and mark the direction in which it
seemed to come.  With the view of ascertaining its origin if possible, I crossed
an intervening farm, and striking into a dense spruce wood, directed my course
towards the point from which it seemed to proceed.  Whilst listening to the
singular note, the accounts which I had seen of the Turdus tinniens or Bell-bird
of the southern portion of the continent forcibly recurred to my mind, and
rendered me doubly eager to discover its source.  This, however, I found to be
no easy matter.  After proceeding a considerable distance in the woods the sound
became suddenly sharp and shrill, and seemed so close behind me that I started
involuntarily.  Having carefully examined all the adjacent trees without
success, I was about giving it up in despair, when the note which first
attracted my attention seemed to come in the former direction.  Before I had
advanced many steps, the sound changed as before; at one moment it seemed behind
me, the next upon the right hand, then upon the left, and then it resumed its
former distant mellow tone.  This occurred so often, that I was completely
puzzled and tempted to give up the pursuit, but still the desire of finding out
the origin of the sound urged me on.  After proceeding a considerable distance
farther, I found that the bell-like sound now came from the opposite direction,
and seemed far beyond the spot where I first heard it.  Retracing my steps I
entered a small cleared spot, in the centre of which stood a black birch, whose
dead and decayed top projected beyond a vigorous growth of fresh branches, by
which its sides were clothed.  As I seated myself upon a prostrate log, the
shrill note was suddenly resumed, and from the direction of the sound I was
convinced that it proceeded from the birch tree.  Almost breathless with
expectation, I carefully examined the tree from top to bottom, but the secret
still remained concealed.  Moving cautiously round, I examined the other side of
the tree, but with no better success, until going to the root, and directing my
eye along the trunk, I observed a sma