Canadian immigrant postman

Owl (also known as owl, owl) has radial feathers around its eyes, and the fine feathers are arranged to form a face plate, which looks like a cat, so it is named owl. Its feathers are mostly brown, scattered with fine spots, thick and soft, and silent when flying. Female owls are usually bigger than males. The head is large and wide, the mouth is short, the side is flat and firm, the top is hooked, the mouth base has no wax film, and it is mostly covered by hard feathers. They also have flexible necks so that their faces can turn back. Due to the special cervical structure, the range of motion of their heads is 270. The left and right ears are asymmetrical, the left ear canal is obviously wider than the right ear canal, and the eardrum of the left ear is developed. Most of them also have clusters of ear feathers, forming auricles similar to humans. The auditory nerve is well developed. A barn owl weighing only 300 grams has about 95,000 auditory nerve cells, while a crow weighing about 600 grams has only 27,000. Owls have keen vision. In the dark night, the visibility is higher than that of people 100 times. Unlike other birds, owl's eggs hatch one by one, and begin to hatch after laying the first egg. Owls are warm-blooded animals.

Living habits

Owls mostly inhabit trees, and some species inhabit rocks and grasslands. The vast majority of owls are Nocturnal Animals. They lie down during the day and go out at night. It is not easy to see them in the caves or eaves of trees during the day, but some species, such as spotted snipe, striped owl and carved owl, are restless and lonely during the day and often go out for activities. Species that have been active at night, once active during the day, tend to fly around like drunkards. Owls mainly eat mice, but also insects, birds, lizards, fish and other animals. Everyone has the habit of spitting "food pills" and has digestive ability. Food is often swallowed whole, and the indigestible bones, feathers, hair, chitin and other residues in food are integrated into pieces to form small balls, which are spit out through the esophagus and mouth, called food pills, also called saliva. Scientists can know their eating habits according to the analysis of edible pills. Once the owl determines the location of its prey, it will attack quickly. Owl's feathers are very soft, and there are velvet-like dense hairs on its wings, so the frequency of sound waves generated by owl when flying is less than 1 kHz, which is not felt by ordinary mammalian ears. This silent attack makes the owl's attack more "blitzkrieg". According to research, when an owl pounces on its prey, its hearing still plays a positioning role. It can constantly adjust the attack direction according to the noise generated by the movement of prey, and finally its claws are extended, killing two birds with one stone. Owls are color blind. They are the only birds that can distinguish blue. Except some birds used to nightlife, such as owls, many birds have a sense of color because there are no cones in the retina. Crows need to find a place to land when flying high in the sky. Color will help them judge the distance and shape, so that they can catch insects flying in the air and land gently on the branches. Birds' color discrimination is also beneficial for them to find a mate. Imagine that males often use gorgeous feathers to attract the opposite sex. If they can't feel the color, what charm does the male have?

distribution range

Owl (also called owl, owl) is one of the most widely distributed birds in the world. Owls can be seen all over the world except the North Pole. The common species in China are carved owl, snipe owl, long-eared owl and short-eared owl.

) owl culture

There is a folk saying in our country that "night owls enter the house, but they are afraid of night owls laughing if they are not afraid of their barking". Owls are often regarded as "ominous birds", called soul-chasing birds and mourning birds. In ancient books, they are also called strange owls, ghost cars, ghosts or wanderers as symbols of bad luck and death. To produce these dwarf owls

The reason for the view may be that owls are very strange, and their eyes are big, round and bright, which makes people feel scared; Ears erect, like a mythical two-horned monster, made the ancients use "eye-catching tiger kiss" to describe cruelty; The owl's cry in the dark is as gloomy and desolate as a ghost, which makes people feel even more horrible. In ancient times, it was called "a bird with a bad voice". In "Talking about the Owl's Moving to the East", "When the owl meets the dove, he says: I will move, and the west hates my voice. ..... "Fable. In addition, owls lie down during the day and come out at night, flying silently like ghosts, and often only see a flash of shadow, which also makes people who don't know much about their behavior have all kinds of terrible associations. Love birds, the goddess of wisdom in ancient Greek mythology, was a small owl (a kind of owl, which was considered to predict events), so the ancient Greeks regarded the owl as a symbol of Athena and wisdom.

The eagle is called a lucky bird, and it has also become the mascot of the Nagano Winter Olympics, representing auspiciousness and happiness. People are afraid of owls and think they can be used to exorcise evil spirits. Accordingly, Thomas, who killed the owl, used the simulated image of the owl to suppress evil. In Britain, people think that eating burnt owl eggs and grinding them into powder can correct their eyesight. Yorkshire people think that soup made of owls can cure whooping cough. In J·K· Rowling's magical novel Harry Potter, owls and toads are wizards' pets. Among these pets, the owl is the noblest and most popular one. Because they can not only help the host distribute mail, but also be veritable "postmen", and they are very knowledgeable about human feelings and language, so they are very wise. Harry Potter and his owl

The descendants of Vancouver Indians in Canada still retain the totem dance of owls, which not only has the image of large woodcarving owls, but also dances. The dancer's costume pattern is an owl, covered with its prey, the mouse. Other such contradictory concepts can be found in Shakespeare's time. In his plays Julius Caesar and Macbeth, he predicted death with the cry of an owl; However, in the play in the futility of love, the owl sang a "happy song". As a literary metaphor, owls can be found in ancient myths, the Old Testament and the works of Hemingway and Milne.

Reproduction and evolution

Breeding owls are usually paired by a male and a female, but some species, such as ghost owls, are paired by a male and a female. Owls usually breed in March-May-June, and some species start breeding earlier, starting from 65438+ 10. Except for a few species, owls do not nest in the breeding process, but use tree holes, caves or other abandoned nests suitable for birds to hatch eggs and raise young. The number of owls laying eggs in a nest is uncertain. The larger ones lay fewer eggs, while the smaller ones usually lay more eggs. The incubation period is about one month. Hatching eggs is generally done only by females, and brooding is done jointly by males and females. Owls are all finished chicks. After hatching, their bodies are covered with feathers, and their eyes and ears are closed. Owls lay eggs and hatch for a long time. Because of the difference of spawning time and hatching time in the same nest, the size of chicks often varies greatly. Some species, such as snowy owls, will have the phenomenon that larger chicks eat young birds, but this phenomenon is not common. Wild owls don't live long. For example, the average life span of barn owls is about three and a half years, and only a few birds can reach 1 1 year. There is limited information about the evolution of owl fossils, which may have originated from Eocene birds of the snipe family, but they have all been extinct in the Miocene strata of France, and now fossils of the genus snipe have been found. In the Miocene strata of Germany, the fossils of the genus Hornowl were found. Fossils of Crassus and Aurelia were found in the lower Oligocene strata of France. Linowls fossils were found in Miocene strata in Germany and North America. No bird fossils of the order Parturidae have been unearthed in China.

Variety classification

At present, it is divided into three families: the original family, the grass family and the family. The original owl family has been extinct; There are 10 species in the world and 3 species in China. There are 126 species in the world and 24 species in China, such as carved owl, snipe and long-eared owl. All ostriches in China are second-class national protected animals. Grass owl family The grass owl family has a long and narrow skull with a monkey-like face and center, and is often called the long-legged "monkey-faced eagle". There are 2 genera 12~ 17 species, 2 genera and 3 species in China. Among them, there are only two species of Castanopsis, which are distributed in Africa and South Asia, and Bermuda grass has 10~ 15 species, mostly distributed in remote islands and Australia, and others are widely distributed. Among them, barn owls can be found in all continents, but their distribution in China is limited, and grass owls are more common in China. Owl is often called "owl" because it has a wide skull, short legs and a cat-like face. Owl family has many kinds, sizes and habits. Some feed on fish, while others come out during the day. Some species have ear clusters, such as long-eared owls, and some species look like eagles without obvious or missing face plates, such as various owls. Owl family is only represented by various eagle owl in Australia, among which the eagle owl is the largest and the only owl endemic to Australia. They are fierce and can prey on larger animals. There are about 28 genera 133 species of LEPIDOPTERA insects, and there are 23 species of1/genus in China.

European owl species

There are thirteen species of owls on the European continent, but most of them still live in Asia and North America. So they have different activity spaces to adapt to their habitats. Snow owls live in northern Europe. Compared with other owl species, such as fierce owl, ghost owl and black owl, snow owl is an owl species forced to migrate to the northernmost part. Carved owl is the largest owl species in Europe. After hundreds of years of human hunting, its number has gradually picked up. Common owls, such as long-eared owls, short-eared owls and grey forest owls, all belong to its prey. Perhaps the barn owl is the most well-known one, because it likes to live where humans farm (or live). The smallest owl in Europe is the flower-headed snipe. The bigger ones are the red-horned owl and the striped owl.

Some extinct owls

Xiaoxiao, it has such a name, because its cry is very strange, and it often laughs like showing off victory. There are two kinds of laughing owls. They live in the northern and southern islands of New Zealand.

Island. They are about 0.4 meters long and are the largest owls in this area. In their living area, there are few small mammals on the ground, so they have to find insects on the ground for food and build nests in caves, cliff cracks and dense vegetation on the cliff. For centuries, the laughing cat laughed and bred its offspring, but after Europeans came here, catching prey on the ground became the achilles heel of the laughing owl. The rats that came here with European immigrants destroyed their nests and greedily ate their eggs. Cats often attack them, too. Rabbits who come to the island with cats and mice become the new prey of the laughing owl, which seems to make up for the damage caused by cats and rats, but rabbits breed too fast. In order to deal with the rampant rabbits, the government adopted the method of killing and introducing weasels, and the rabbits soon decreased until they disappeared. The weasel, who was keen on killing rabbits, became an owl. For weasels, rocks and cliffs are not a problem. The laughing owl nest on the ground became a table for weasels to taste owl eggs and owls. The extermination started by cats and mice was finally completed by weasels. From 1850 to 1890, laughing owls were rarely seen on the northern islands of New Zealand, only two were caught. 1900, the laughing owl has disappeared in the northern islands, and so has the southern islands. The laughing owl was last seen in 19 14 in Bru Kokov, South Canterbury. From then on, people can no longer see the laughing owl and hear its loud laughter showing off victory. Laughing owl: 19 14 extinct.

Owl feeding

1. Wild owls don't eat people. They have to open their mouths and send meat, usually lean meat, down their throats. 2. Feed water, break its mouth with your hand, and then inject it into your mouth with a syringe with a needle pulled out. Owl is a national second-class protected animal, and it is not allowed to be raised, which will violate the law. Those who are light are fined and released, and those who are heavy are detained, which violates the criminal law. But it seems that you can apply.

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