03.04.2009

When did you last hear Little Owl?

Have you ever seen it? Little owl is one of the rarest birds in north eastern part of Slovenia! In the past, people believed that Little Owl attract the death, because it had been often heard at night, calling at the window of the deceased. However, the light of windows attracted the large, active insects at night - the night butterflies, which are important Little Owl`s food. Because of the excessive use of poisons against the insects and small rodents and lacking of the appropriate nests, Little Owl belongs to the most endangered birds in Goričko region.

Little owl, which was named after the Greek goddess Athena (the Latin name for it is Athene noctua), inhabits mainly semi-open cultural areas. The favoured breeding habitat is believed to be areas with pastures, orchards with tall-trunk trees, old willow trees and abandoned old buildings. Because of the lack of old willow trees with hollows, the Public Institution Nature Park Goričko decided to place nesting boxes for Little Owl. Therefore we invited a class of the primary school in Murska Sobota, to participate and to build wooded, one meter long, cylindrical shaped nesting boxes. In the search for relevant sites and installation, Reljko Calamun, member of the Birdlife Slovenia, DOPPS, joined us. In agreement with the owners of abandoned old houses and old willow trees we installed in February at various locations within range of Nature Park Goričko, 11 horizontal placed nesting boxes. We really hope the Little Owls will breed their young in these boxes and thus the number of these small but important owls for the natural balance will increase.

At the last survey of Scops Owl Otus scops in 2007, using the playback method, we heard only 8 calling males of Little Owl in a whole Nature Park Goričko. Is this number going to increase after the setting the nest boxes, we will find out already this summer, when we plan next survey of Scops Owl and Little Owl.


Written by Gregor Domanjko
Photographed by Zeljko Salamun and Gregor Domanjko

For more information I am available at gregor.domanjko@goricko.info