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Little Owl or Long Eared Owl

Yangxian, December 2013

Thanks in advance ..

Long-eared Owl.

Little Owl is very small and flies fast, in a woodpecker-like manner. Its underwing lacks the black marking ('comma'), and is very difficult to see in flight anyway.

any thanks bart .. cheers

looks more like a short-eared owl, in my opinion... But I have not seen long-eared owl in flight

[[i] Last edited by Ronaldo at 4/12/2013 23:22 [/i]]

[quote]Original posted by [i]Ronaldo[/i] at 4/12/2013 23:20 [url=http://www.hkbws.org.hk/BBS/redirect.php?goto=findpost&pid=61206&ptid=20145][img]http://www.hkbws.org.hk/BBS/images/common/back.gif[/img][/url]
looks more like a short-eared owl, in my opinion... But I have not seen long-eared owl in flight [/quote]

thanks for the reply!

My friend's initial thought was the little owl and then mine was the short-eared owl .. but then after consulting various people, I am also leaning towards long-eared owl ..

A Short-eared Owl shows darker wing tips (outer primaries), is less streaked below (streaking confined to the breast and absent towards the belly), is differently streaked (stripes and anchors in Long-eared, just stripes in Short-eared), has broader black bars on the tail and a broad white trailing edge to the wing (best seen from above though).

The bird on this picture shows all five characters pointing to Long-eared Owl, in my view.

Bart, I think the features you mention depend on the owl. May be more pictures would clarify the extent of stripes on the belly. If you look at Oriental Bird pictures, it is not as obvious as you say. Unfortunately, there are few Long-eared Owl pictures in flight to compare. I know Short-eared can be commonly active in day-time in winter, but am not sure that the long-eared owl also hunts in day time.

[url]http://orientalbirdimages.org/search.php?Bird_ID=628&Bird_Image_ID=67490&p=10[/url]
[url]http://orientalbirdimages.org/search.php?Bird_ID=628&Bird_Image_ID=59837&Bird_Family_ID=&p=12[/url]
[url]http://orientalbirdimages.org/search.php?Bird_ID=628&Bird_Image_ID=33441&Bird_Family_ID=&p=49[/url]

Long-eared and Short-eared Owls are very similar, but I'd agree with Bart that Wilson's photo shows a Long-eared Owl.

If you compare the wing tip pattern of the Short-eared Owls on the OBC website with Wilson's bird, you'll see that Short-eared Owl has obvious black tips to the outer 3-4 primaries and another black bar a little further inside the primaries. Long-eared Owl has a less contrasting black pattern on these primaries.

An excellent reference is the [i]Collins Bird Guide: The Most Complete Guide to the Birds of Britain and Europe[/i].

David

[[i] Last edited by ddavid at 5/12/2013 23:19 [/i]]

Much appreciate for all the expert advise,..

@Ronaldo
Short-eared Owl is a diurnal hunter, which Long-eared isn't, as far as I know, but on active migration in both northern Europe and northern China Long-eared Owls are regularly seen in day-time flight, often as they arrive in off the sea - I saw one at Happy Island near Beidaihe like that a few years back.

[quote]Original posted by [i]Ronaldo[/i] at 5/12/2013 21:37 [url=http://www.hkbws.org.hk/BBS/redirect.php?goto=findpost&pid=61219&ptid=20145][img]http://www.hkbws.org.hk/BBS/images/common/back.gif[/img][/url]
Bart, I think the features you mention depend on the owl. May be more pictures would clarify the extent of stripes on the belly. If you look at Oriental Bird pictures, it is not as obvious as you say. ... [/quote]

Yes, you made a good point here. There is often variation. For example, a Short-eared Owl's eyes are supposed to be yellow (never orange) and a Long-eared Owl's eyes orange. But the latter can sometimes show orange-yellow eyes. Wilson's bird looks like a Short-eared if you see its eye.

There is obviously some variation on the underparts too. But one bird on the photographs ([url]http://bit.ly/1bn6jnB[/url]), can only be seen from aside. And the belly (which is not visible) is not the same as the flanks (which are visible). So to be more precise: Short-eared Owl shows dark markings on the breast and the flanks and generally not on the belly and vent. The two other photo's ([url]http://bit.ly/1iGTo5q[/url] and [url]http://bit.ly/1gcEy4R[/url]) do show this, in my view, but maybe not as obvious as one would have thought from my writing.

In Long-eared Owl the marking runs down to the belly and even further. A good example to show the difference: [url]http://bit.ly/1dURWdx[/url] (and, yes, the middle one is an odd bird...).

You can see a Long-eared from below here: [url]http://bit.ly/IHK4xi.[/url] Compare again to these: [url]http://bit.ly/18osFnp[/url] and [url]http://bit.ly/1gKeOKz.[/url]

And then I came across this one: [url]http://bit.ly/18INaxQ.[/url] A Long-eared in all respects (e.g. pattern of tail and outer primaries), but with a clearly unmarked belly...

However, a difference that is more obvious, is the pattern of the dark markings. As I said, just stripes in Short-eared and stripes and anchors in Long-eared. Combined with tail pattern and outer primary pattern, it doesn't leave much choice than name Wilson's bird a Long-eared.

Bart

thanks a lot for all the detailed info.

appreciate all the feedback and help .. do we concur with a Long-Eared Owl on this one?  thanks

On views such as these the white trailing edge to the secondaries and primaries would be obvious on a Short-eared Owl.  To me this has always been the quickest way to separate the two in flight especially in the days when I lived somewhere where both were not uncommon!