Visual predators often have a search image for one prey item

Visual predators often have a search image for one prey item that they eat most often. Barn owls are opportunistic but usually have strong search images for a particular prey species they can easily Find in their areas. Using the table below, answer the following questions a-e. Regional Barn Owls & the Prey Items Caught a. Do all barn owls in the United States search for the same prey? _______ b. What is the favored prey of the Southern Barn owls? _______ c. There are several species of mice including the deer mouse, house mouse and field mouse. What would probably be the favored prey of an Eastern urban barn owl living in a city park verses an owl that lives in a rural area on the side of a field? Explain your reasoning. d. When I lived in Africa, I was tracking elephants with a group of students. We were observing a group of five elephants from under an Acacia tree when all at once a leopard jumped over our heads, out of the tree and ran off. Why do you think the leopard didn\'t go for the group of humans? Explain your thoughts. e. Owls, hawks and eagles are types of raptors. These animals are carnivores with hooked beaks and sharp claws called talons. Hawks and eagles differ from owls in that they eat their prey animals by tearing them into small pieces, picking out the flesh and avoiding most of the fur and bones. Any material that is left is processed into a pellet similar to the owl pellet you have dissected today. Do you think an eagle pellet would be as useful for scientists as an owl pellet? Explain your thinking.

Solution

A) NO

B) RATS

C) As house mouse occupies urban areas, the deer mouse and field mouse is more common in rural or semi-rural areas so the eastern urban barn owl that reside in city park will favour house mouse where as the owl that reside in rural areas will prefer deer and field mouse

D) Because they tolerate and prefer proximity to humans.

E) Since owls mostly swallow the food thats why most of the prey\'s bones are not actually broken during the attack and the subsequent digestion process,and so they can be easily identified in the pellet. Besides this most pellets include skull , which makes identification of the prey relatively simple. On the other eagles pellets are smaller and contain lesser animal parts than owls.So for this reason eagle pellet is not as useful as owls pellet