Williamson's Weekly Nature Notes
THE barn owl used to be the commonest owl in the county. That was in 1891 and was the opinion of William Borrer, descendant of the famous botanist William Borrer of Henfield.
By 1938 John Walpole-Bond agreed that it may have been so once, but not now. Seventy years on today the idea of barn owls being as numerous as tawny owls is a distant dream.
About 100 pairs of barn owls live in East and West Sussex.
Tawny owls, which are also called wood owls and brown owls, are far more common, the exact number unknown. A pair of tawny owls per 50 acres of woodland seems reasonable.
Barn owls were once so badly persecuted it is a wonder they survived at all a century ago.
For full feature see West Sussex Gazette September 24