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Eurasian Scops-Owl (Otus scops)

In contrast to most European owls, which are hardy, the Scops Owl is a bird of warm climates, with its centre of distribution around the Mediterranean and Black Sea. Being largely insectivorous it is also the only European owl that is a regular trans-equatorial migrant, like a Swallow or a Cuckoo, although some Short-eared Owls may also cross the Sahara. Birds normally arrive on their breeding grounds in March and leave again in September, and their migration is pretty impressive. All the signs are that in autumn they overfly most the Mediterranean and the Sahara in a single long flight. Unusually among bird migrants, they are reported to do so in family groups. In some parts of Europe an element of the population stays put in winter.

It’s not difficult to detect a Scops Owl, because the males in spring utter a very distinctive, sonorous, whistling “tiu” as their advertising call, and repeat it every few seconds with great regularity and stamina, seemingly for hours on end. The females can make this call, too, and they themselves may advertise to males early in the season, in a reversal of the normal roles. When male and female meet, they often put their calls together and make a duet.

The Scops Owl’s favourite foods are insects, especially crickets and beetles, which it normally catches by ambushing them on the ground, having spotted them from an elevated perch first. Moths, being pesky, uncontrollable things, can often only be caught by some clever footwork in mid-air after a rapid aerial chase. The Scops Owl also eats worms, small birds and mammals, including, occasionally, bats. As this indicates, it is very much a nocturnal forager.

These birds are quite adaptable in the habitats they select for breeding and the sites they adopt for nesting. All they require for the former are plenty of insects, some fallow ground and some old trees for roosting, and for the latter they will use a variety of holes (including the burrows of Bee-eaters) as well as the old nests of birds such as Crows. This flexibility has allowed them to inhabit parks and gardens where they are common, and even penetrate into urban areas.