Autumn is a busy time for tawny owls, and on most nights now you can hear the males calling as they establish their territories. It’s just the male that makes the familiar hooting, while the female answers with a sharp, shrill kewick that is usually repeated several times. The sound of hooting tawny owls is invariably added by film makers to night scenes to add a suitably eerie atmosphere. However, it’s not unusual for the producer to get it wrong, adding tawny owl calls to dramas set in Ireland, where this owl doesn’t occur. A classic example of this can be heard in the film Far and Away, starring Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman.

I have tried to establish whether tawnies call most on clear, star-lit nights, when there is a bright moon, or when it’s cloudy and overcast, but haven’t come up with any conclusions. Still nights with a clear sky are often good for hearing owls, though sometimes the conditions seem perfect, but there’s not an owl to be heard.

A desirable residence
Two other species of owls are common around Bardwell. Barn owls are doing well locally, helped by the Suffolk Community Barn Owl Project that has erected hundreds of boxes throughout the county. I put up one of the project’s boxes on a lime tree in our paddock here at Bowbeck, but so far it has failed to be adopted, though it is a mortgage-free and highly desirable residence. We do see barn owls here, though mainly in the late winter and early spring.  I suspect that there’s not sufficient rough grassland in the area to sustain a hunting pair. The habitat is much more suitable on the meadows on either side of the Black Bourn, which is why many of you who live in the village are fortunate enough to see barn owls regularly.

If you do want to watch hunting barn owls, then the most reliable site locally is Micklemere, the Suffolk Wildlife Trust’s reserve at Ixworth. Sit in the hide at dusk and the chances are high that you will get great views of an owl. Several nest boxes have been erected around Micklemere, and a pair used one of them successfully this year.

Owl on a post
I saw a little owl sitting on a telegraph pole at the Bowbeck crossroads when I first came to view Forge Cottage: I regarded it as a good omen, and an incentive to move here. There are several pairs of little owls resident in and around Bardwell, though it’s a species I hear more often than I see. However, they are often active during the day, and I’ve seen them several times when I’ve been playing tennis on the MUGA. They evidently regard the playing field as a good place to hunt.

Mystery bird
Our fourth owl, the long eared, is the most mysterious. Unlike the other three it is relatively quiet, and even the male’s territorial call is easily missed unless you know what you are listening for. It is chiefly nocturnal species, though I have on occasions seen them hunting in bright sunshine on summer evenings.

Long eared owls don’t get on well with the bigger and more powerful tawny owl, so if the latter is abundant, then the former will be scarce. I suspect that long eared may breed locally, though my only evidence is a sighting of one sitting in the middle of the Bowbeck-Coney Weston road in April last year. I was driving slowly, so was able to stop and admire it, illuminated by the headlights, and even see the so-called ears, which are in fact nothing of the sort.

Every autumn eastern England receives an influx of long eared owls from Scandinavia, so the next few months are the best for seeing this handsome species. Wintering birds usually roost communally, and it’s not unusual to see anything from three or four to a dozen or more, roosting close to each other, sometimes even in the same tree. If you do come across one of these owls locally, then I’d be delighted to hear from you.

David Tomlinson Oct 2009