Owl chevêche

The owl chevêche is an owl of small size, with the squat aspect. It is most diurnal of the owls, in spite of its Latin name ( Athene noctua ). One can observe it in full day perched on posts or roofs, very attentive and making “reverences”. It presents a very undulating flight. It meets in the even cultivated opened mediums, niche in the cavities of the old trees or the buildings unoccupied, or in burrows. It owes its generic name with the goddess Athéna, of which it is the animal symbolic system.

Characteristics

  • Description: of small size, squat, a little smaller than a pigeon, 26 cm, round with the squat aspect, its head is flattened with a low face; its eyes yellow under white eyebrows and are wrinkled, which confers a severe air to him. The cranium is piqueté small white spots. Its nozzle is yellow/green

    • Plumage: on the top of the body, the plumage brown/gray is sown clearer spots; the breast piece is blanchâtre with brown stripes. The tail is short. The legs are covered small white feathers.

Manners

It is most diurnal of the owls, in spite of its Latin name ( Athene noctua ). One can observe it in full day perched on posts or roofs, very attentive and making “reverences”. It presents a very undulating flight.

She lives the edges, thickets of trees, scrap-metals, orchards… She meets in the even cultivated opened mediums, niche in the cavities of the old trees or the buildings unoccupied, or in burrows.

Food

The owl chevêche nourishes itself of many Insecte S but also ground worms, small Mammifère S (field voles, shrews…), reptiles (lizards), sparrows, bats.

It drives out the evening of the insects (cockchafers especially) and the night of the field voles. It sometimes happens to him to drive out the day of the small birds, especially at the time of the nourrissage of the young people.

Its balls of rejection measure 35mm on approximately 15 mm.

Habitat

The owl chevêche is widespread in all Europe, except for Ireland and of the Scandinavia. In France there is less and less.

One finds it in the cultivated zones or the meadows intersected with hedges; she does not like dense timberings and prefers to nest in old hollow shafts, in the clapas (they are stone heaps made by the farmers), but also in the thickets, the holes of walls, the nesting boxes provided that they are in the darkness. She remains faithful to the same year housing by year and can even nest in rabbit burrows.

She measures approximately 23 cm, and weighs from 180 to 200 grams; its scale measures 50 cm on average.

She saw on average 9 years in kind and 18 years in captivity.

Voice

The cry of the owl chevêche resembles a “gnouk”, a brief “kvitt kvitt”, or “kiff kiff kiff” or even a " kfit kfit".

Reproduction

The female lays from 4 to 8 eggs in its nest, and broods during 26 to 28 days. The chicks are born covered from a thick sleeping bag and are nourished insects and small vertebrate. They are able to fly then to leave the nest after 28 to 35 days.

The egg measures from 32 to 37 mm by 36 to 31 Misters.

Origin

The chevêche is originating in the open mediums of the Mediterranean basin. It gradually extended its surface of distribution while following the man who opened the forest medium with the evolution of agriculture, making it favourable with the chevêche.

A little history

It owes its generic name with the Athéna goddess, of which it is the animal symbolic system. In the Greek antiquity, the owl chevêche, attribute of Athéna, symbol of Knowledge (wisdom but also science…) became naturally that of the town of Athens. This city took for currency, the Drachme which represented them both. This drachma extended then to all Greece then disappeared (like the franc) on arrival from the Euro. But one again finds it today on the coins of 1 Greek euro. Owl miracle , despizing millenia, the same small owl decorates the 2 currencies malicieusement… symbol each of two apparently opposite universes.

References

See too

  • the logo of the school of engineer SUPAERO represents an owl chevêche stylized.

Books

  • the chevêche of Athéna - biology, manners, mythology, protection , of Jean-Claude Génot, Patrick Lecomte, with the editions Delachaux and Niestlé

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