We have had our best year ever for numbers of pairs of Little Owls in our nestboxes, and Bob Sheppard and I have ringed over 100 Little Owls this year (only around 300 - 400 get ringed annually in the UK!). However success was as low as last year with only 75 chicks from 47 pairs - the dry weather in April and early May caused may of the earlier broods to fail. Later pairs were saved by the rain and did reasonably OK. Overall success in terms of chicks per pair were 2.0 in 2006, 2.6 in 2007, 1.6 in 2008 and 1.6 in 2009.
Alan
|