Ornamental scops owl
| Ornamental scops owl | ||||||||||
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| Systematics | ||||||||||
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||
| Otus elegans | ||||||||||
| ( Cassin , 1852) |
The jewelry Zwergohreule ( Otus elegans ) is an owl from the genus of scops owl . It can be found on a few small islands in eastern East Asia .
description
The very small owl grows to about eight inches long and weighs between one hundred and 107 grams. The gray-brown morph is yellowish to gray-brown at the top with dark scribbles and lines and some whitish spots. Dull yellow to white shoulder feathers form a whitish shoulder band. On the lighter underside there are bone patterns and shaft lines. The red morph is darker red-brown. The eyes are yellow, the beak is dark horn-colored, the feather ears are relatively long. The legs are feathered up to the gray-brown toes, the claws blackish horn-colored.
Way of life
It inhabits evergreen forests, originally primary forests , but today also managed forests, sometimes it comes to settlements. It mainly catches insects such as beetles, crickets and grasshoppers, as well as spiders and small vertebrates. The call is a cough-like kju-guruk that is repeated fifteen to thirty times per minute.
distribution
O. e. elegans lives on the Ryūkyū Islands and Daitō Islands . The subspecies O. e. botelensis on the island of Lanyu with only 150 to 200 birds is a bit lighter and more long-winged. The dark and short-winged subspecies O. e occurs on Batan , Calayan and perhaps other islands north of Luzon . calayensis , which may not belong to this species.
literature
- Heimo Mikkola: Handbook owls of the world. All 249 species in 750 color photos. Original title: Owls of the World. A photographic guide. 2012, German-language edition, Franckh-Kosmos Verlags-GmbH & Co.KG, Stuttgart 2013, ISBN 978-3-440-13275-3 , p. 160.