On the other hand, there is sometimes good reason for modifying any plea
for kindness to owls. Handsome is as handsome does, and many of these
birds are, during the nesting season, not only savage in defence of
their young, but actually so aggressive as to make unprovoked attack on
all and sundry who unwittingly approach closer to the tree than these
devoted householders think desirable. Accounts of this troublesome mood
in nesting owls come from several parts of the country, and notably from
Wales. In one case on record a pair of barn owls had their home in a
tree overlooking Milford Haven, and the vicinity of the nest soon became
dangerous. The male owl tore a boy's ear, knocked a man down, and
attacked numerous human beings and dogs that made use of a path leading
past the tree; and these episodes were in fact of daily occurrence until
some one shot the bird. Another pair of barn owls nested in a wood on
the shore of Menai Strait, and in this case the young birds managed to
fall out of the nest, and lay on the ground in full view of a public
right of way. Why the old birds did not put their offspring back in the
nest no one knew. Possibly they realised that the talons, which so
efficiently gripped rats, might not prove gentle enough for the
transport of owlets. At any rate, whatever their reason, they left the
young birds on the ground, feeding them in that position, and flew at
everyone who passed that way, clawing face and ears, and eventually
establishing a reign of terror. Another owl behaved in somewhat similar
fashion in a spinney close to Axmouth, South Devon, punishing a
coastguard so severely that the man took to his heels. Such determined
tactics in defence of the young are the more singular when we remember
that owls are, in normal circumstances, shy and retiring birds. Yet they
occasionally seem to be possessed by more sociable instincts, in proof
of which one of the long-eared kind has been seen feeding in the company
of tame hawks; a pair of owls once nested in a dovecote close to a
keeper's lodge in the Highlands; and wild owls have been known to pay
nightly visits to a cage in the Botanic Gardens at Launceston
(Tasmania), in order to bring food to their captive friends.

Even apart from these rigorous measures of defence, the nesting habits
of owls are not without interest. The majority lay their eggs in either
hollow trees or ruins, and it is worth remark that these nocturnal
birds bring up their youn