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Birdwatching in Africa - Northern White-faced Owl, Ptilopsis leucotis


The Northern White-faced Owl (Ptilopsis leucotis) is a species of owl in the family Strigidae. The Southern White-faced Owl (P. granti) was formerly included in this species and the two were known as the white-faced scops-owl.

It is found in a band across Africa between the Sahara and the Equator. It occurs in Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Ivory Coast, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, Togo and Uganda.

Range map from www.oiseaux.net

Range map
Range map from www.oiseaux.net - Ornithological Portal Oiseaux.net
www.oiseaux.net is one of those MUST visit pages if you're in to bird watching. You can find just about everything there


Length: 25 cm
Wingspan: 50 cm
Weight: 185 à 220 g
Longevity:
Distinctive Feature

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Similar Species

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From opus at www.birdforum.net the forum for wild birds and birding.
Female / Male

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From opus at www.birdforum.net the forum for wild birds and birding.


Northern White-faced Owl, Ptilopsis leucotis
Northern White-faced Owl pellet
Ethiopia - October 2019


A pellet,

in ornithology, is the mass of undigested parts of a bird's food that some bird species occasionally regurgitate. The contents of a bird's pellet depend on its diet, but can include the exoskeletons of insects, indigestible plant matter, bones, fur, feathers, bills, claws, and teeth. In falconry, the pellet is called a casting.

The passing of pellets allows a bird to remove indigestible material from its proventriculus, or glandular stomach. In birds of prey, the regurgitation of pellets serves the bird's health in another way, by "scouring" parts of the digestive tract, including the gullet. Pellets are formed within six to ten hours of a meal in the bird's gizzard (muscular stomach).

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Listen to the Northern White-faced Owl

www.xeno-canto.org


Fight-or-flight response
This owl has a rather notable defense mechanism. When faced with a similar-sized predator (like another owl slightly larger than it) the bird flares its wings to appear larger.

When faced with something much larger than itself (such as an eagle), it pulls its feathers inwards, elongates its body, and narrows its eyes to thin slits. It is thought that it uses this ability to camouflage itself, and it shares the ability with relatives like the African scops owl.

Many different types of owls have some ability to adopt a "concealing posture", also known by the German word Tarnstellung, in which they squeeze and thin their body to look like a broken tree branch, and some types may also narrow their eyes to slits and fold a wing sideways across their chest in a Dracula-like manner to hide the lighter-colored feathers on their underparts. Such behavior has also been documented in Eastern screech owls in a natural setting reacting to threats

In popular culture
A member of this species named "Popo-chan" was the subject of a Japanese television show.

Conservation status
Conservation status
Least Concern (IUCN 3.1)
IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Downloaded on 24 July 2007.


From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

www.birdforum.net


Sighted: (Date of first photo that I could use) 29 October 2019
Location: Sabana Beach Resort at Lake Langano, Ethiopia

Northern White-faced Owl, Ptilopsis leucotis
Northern White-faced Owl - 28 October 2019 - Sabana Beach Resort at Lake Langano, Ethiopia

Northern White-faced Owl, Ptilopsis leucotis
Northern White-faced Owl - 28 October 2019 - Sabana Beach Resort at Lake Langano, Ethiopia



PLEASE! If I have made any mistakes identifying any bird, PLEASE let me know on my guestbook



       
                  



                                       

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