Serendib Scops Owl

Photo by Wayne Geater

Stumbled upon this beautiful bird this morning. I love the coloring and the subtle speckling. Make sure you zoom in on this photo to get a good look!

This owl was discovered 2001, and was the first new bird discovered in Sri Lanka since 1868. It lives in remote rainforest, where it is the only nocturnal avian predator.

The person who finally discovered it had heard an unknown bird call and chased it for 6 years before finally finding this tiny owl.

In 2006, the population was estimated at only 80 birds. Truly rare, and I’m glad we get to see it, and hopefully it will be protected.

Transcendant,

Are these the shapeshifting owls? Saw a YouTube video a while back and it’s incredible, like a transformer the way they rearrange their face & body

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

You’re probably thinking of the White Faced Scops Owl. They are in most of the videos I’ve seen of the defense postures.

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/ae9ff23c-3316-4637-9ff5-30df3bf5bf53.jpeg

Other owls do this as well, and whether they puff or elongate seems to be based on if they intended to intimidate or hide.

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/c107908e-d391-4a77-83a0-db5a722659fe.jpeg

Here’s a common Screech Owl doing the elongation thing.

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/da4a4394-6c42-4838-80a9-b6ad371841d5.jpeg

Here’s a medium sized owl, a Long Eared Owl, going for the pufferfish technique.

It’s amazing the transformations they’re capable of!

Transcendant,

Incredible birds aren’t they, thanks for adding so much context & info to my comment!

Most birds I just don’t find very interesting… But corvids, parrots and owls are amazing. Also hawks are pretty damn cool.

One of my life goals is to befriend a crow. My dad has a regular magpie pair who cheekily visit his garden so maybe I can befriend them

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

I think birds get written off since many are so present in our daily life that they just become part of the scenery and it can be hard to tell one individual from another so they feel interchangable.

Raptors and corvids are easy to get into, with their large size, intelligence, and impressive physical features.

I’ve befriended an ever growing group of bluejays at my house. I gave one a peanut one day for fun, and now I’m to to around 7 that keep an eye out for me and will call me to get my attention. A pair of cardinals had started watching the jays get fed and have gotten into copying their behavior as well.

I can’t tell them apart visually, they don’t really sit still long, but I can tell who’s who by how they approach and their individual risk tolerances and how they treat the other jays. They’ve been a real please to observe and fire us to get to know each other. I miss them greatly now that I’m doing in person work again.

I had always wanted to befriend a crow as well, but seeing how much food these little birds can eat had be scared of picking up the food bill for a pack of crows!

I’m glad this guy could get your attention today. If you’re new here, you can check out my Owl-natomy posts or my recent bird banding writeup if you want a deeperb dive into the biology and study of raptors. Mainly owls of course, but I’ll include some hawks and vultures some times with event photos or they’re in dinner if the scientific papers I’ll link for anyone that wants the full data. There’s one for predator/prey chase techniques for example.

I stay away from the meme post stuff myself, and try to add knowledge and places you can go see birds in person. I posted the 50 States of Owls so people in each state could go see raptors in person. One person says they had signed up to the volunteer class for one of them even! I enjoy learning, and you guys asking things gives me guys directions to share knowledge to you and me. I’ve been learning a lot these last few months doing all these posts. I hope you stick around!

Transcendant,

Yeah that’s a really good point about them being overlooked due to being so prevalent in our world.

I’ve subscribed 😁 just had a good laugh at the Magpie God

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

Glad to have you with us!

Even if you don’t follow along too closely, I still try to give you a neat bird or 2 a day to look forward to. I just try to make this a positive place where you can learn if you want, it just look at some cool birds.

Transcendant,

You’re doing an amazing job, people like you are what makes lemmy such an awesome place to spend time. Thank you!

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

Stop, you embarrass me! 😅

I’m just glad everyone is having fun!

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

Do you have any thoughts on the posts of these rare owls?

A lot of them don’t seem to be popular, so I want see if you weren’t as interested since they’re unfamiliar or are they sad in that many of these might disappear in the near future, etc?

I like seeing them, since it’s likely my only opportunity to ever see then, due to how remote and rare they are. I also feel closer to nature by learning about more animals that I never even knew were there and that they need to be cared about even if I’ll never see one outside a photo.

How do you feel?

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

I saw a few things saying that these aren’t really ear tufts on this owl. Haven’t gotten to research that yet, but here’s one of the articles (PDF file) I plan to read that supposedly talks about it. It also had some nice pictures too. I’ll report back here once I read it, but if you want to check it out before I get to it, here you go.

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

Tl;dr - They’re not plumicorns because they’re part of the facial disc, not part of the top of the head.

The false plumicorns are controlled by the muscles of the facial disc, so they are moved by different muscles than true plumicorns. They also only seem to put them up during the day and only raise them at night when they’re alerted to something.

It’s more like an exaggerated forehead ridge, where if you’d scowl you’d get those forehead wrinkles. This pulls up the feathers, enhancing the owl’s crest and making the cute little fake horns.

I’ll post the pics from the PDF linked above. You should read it though. It isn’t that long and is written by the discoverer and talks about how he discovered the owl and went about studying it and verifying it was indeed a new species. Really great article!

anon6789, (edited )
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/9e271b3e-c009-43a7-bf27-765e9bcd6fe2.jpeg

First captured specimen, male. The discoverer is on the right with the mustache.

anon6789, (edited )
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/03a343a1-6442-4390-bb39-bf1e7c2fc75c.jpeg

Males have oranger eyes, female have more yellow.

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/5e9b01d6-8fdd-4ffb-9753-06c342c70814.jpeg

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/a704abc1-41ad-4129-b4ff-3c460dd4264e.jpeg

Faux-tufts relaxed

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/256810e0-a9f7-47e6-8981-0824a2250c49.jpeg

Unlike most owl species, these seem to roost together in pairs fairly often.

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/f11acdbe-3881-41ef-8080-0cb72aa54a6a.jpeg

Juvenile in front

anon6789,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/cd0c2e52-57b4-4c97-9880-3c5e4453d270.jpeg

A bonus, a Collared Scops Owl, from the photographer’s other photos in Sri Lanka.

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