Barn Owls Lab Report

Barn owls are a medium size predator found all around the world, however are prominently habitat across North America. Barn owls typically hunt at night using sound to catch available prey. Since most rodents are commonly nocturnal, the availability of owl’s diet is dependent on rodent food source in contrast to nonrodent food source. Over 95% of the barn owl’s diet consists of mostly rodents, and the rest consisting of bird remains (Ingles, 1995). Barn owl species prey primarily on a diet that has variety consisting mostly of small, nocturnal mammals. In this lab, rats, mice and voles are considered rodents. On the contrary, shrews and moles are considered not rodents. Owls are not like the typical bird species. Barn owls swallow their

The data collected from previous classes had a total of 77 owl pellets that were dissected. Out of the 77 total of owl pellets that were examined, a total of 137 rodents skulls were found in the owl pellets compared to a total of 32 nonrodent skulls that were uncovered in the owl pellet. The data in Figure 1, demonstrates the average total number of rodent skulls compared to average nonrodent skulls found in the final spreadsheet from the total number of owl pellets dissected in each class. On average, the amount of rodent skull prey caught is 1.80 in an owl pellet in a night compared to 0.42 nonrodent prey skulls found in an owl

The role of the barn owl is necessary in order to control the amount of animals that the barn owl species consumes. Without this keystone species of barn owls, the rodent population would dominate and the variety of the ecosystem an would result in an overall declination because the lack of other species to thrive while the rodents are prominent amongst the biosphere. With barn owl species a top predator of rodents, the diversity of the ecosystem is preserved while owls are apart of the