Barn owl - Suffolk bird made the wrong decision!
Extract from The Ibis journal, April 1941
My brother tells me of the following incident which occurred at his estate at Theberton in Suffolk last May.
One evening, just after dark, the cries of a kitten were heard coming from the park, and these were traced to the twiggy growth of a lime tree some 18 feet from the ground.
A ladder was brought, and, on reaching the scene of the plaintive cries a white owl flew out, and a small black kitten, but two days old, was found in an empty nest.
The kitten was recognised as one of a litter from the farm some 200 yards distant.
There was no visible injury on the kitten, but it suffered thereafter from inability to retract its claws, and died before it was two months old.
Doubtless the kitten had been mistaken for a rat, seized, and carried off by the owl.
On reaching its 'dining room', it would have discovered that some mistake had been made.
No doubt the kitten's cries coming from an imagined rat made the owl pause with his meal - a respite which saved the little animal's life.
I understand that cats are not a favoured article of diet among flesh-eating animals, and, though there are exceptions, no doubt an owl will not willingly take kittens.
Colonel R. Meinertzhagen
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