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Petite Nyctale
This little study needs an explanation. It shows a Northern Saw-whet Owl, but it is the very distinctly marked (and seldom seen or illustrated) subspecies found only on Queen Charlotte Island, off the coast of British Columbia. It was named by Toronto-based naturalist, J. H. Fleming after Major Allan Brooks, the India-born Canadian bird artist and illustrator whose work was enormously influential on me as a youngster growing up. The specimen I used to help me get the colour and markings correct was from the Fleming collection, in fact, a collection now housed in the Royal Ontario Museum, to whom I am eternally grateful for all their wonderful support through my lifetime.



This is not a great painting, more of a study, but I wanted to pay tribute to this endemic Canadian form so seldom illustrated. The pose is based on a sketch from a live bird (but of the nominate race). They are common migrants here in southern Ontario, but can be very difficult to find. Once found, however, they pose very nicely.



These little owls from Queen Charlotte Islands…they weigh around eighty or ninety grams…are very similar to the immature plumage of the widely spread nominate race, and a third subspecies, A. a. brodkorbi, from Mexico, but are not quite the same. Those immature birds do not have the reddish streaking on the buffy background of the belly (and have darker eyes…sort of dusky-greenish).



There have been suggestions that these distinctive Queen Charlotte birds should be considered a distinct species, because of how different they are from other Northern Saw-whet Owls, but they do freely hybridize with mainland birds that make it to Queen Charlotte Island, thus fit the definition of a subspecies.


Reproduction interdite... © Barry Kent Mackay

L'espèce

Classification

Ordre : Strigiformes
Famille : Strigidés
Espèce : Petite Nyctale


Photos de l'espèce

de l'auteur
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La photo

Référence O.Net : bkma96316
Auteur :

Prise de vue

Date : 2011
Pays : Canada (ca)
Région : British Columbia
Lieu : Kindakun Rock Kindakun Rock
Lat. : 53° 31' 55'' Nord
Lng. : 132° 57' 29'' Ouest

Données Exif [+][-]

Flash : non