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Scops owls are typical owls in family Strigidae belonging to the genus Otus and are restricted to the Old World. Otus is the largest genus of owls with 59 species.Scops owls are colored in various brownish hues, sometimes with a lighter underside and/or face, which helps to camouflage them against the bark of trees.
The Eurasian scops owl is 19–21 cm (7.5–8.3 in) in length with a wingspan of 47–54 cm (19–21 in). This is somewhat smaller than the little owl (Athene noctua). It perches upright and shows small ear-tufts. The plumage is predominantly grey-brown in colour, with a paler face, underparts and shoulder line.
Giant scops owl: Otus gurneyi (Tweeddale, 1879) 108 White-fronted scops owl: Otus sagittatus (Cassin, 1849) 109 Reddish scops owl: Otus rufescens (Horsfield, 1821) 110 Serendib scops owl: Otus thilohoffmanni Warakagoda & Rasmussen, 2004: 111 Sandy scops owl: Otus icterorhynchus (Shelley, 1873) 112 Sokoke scops owl: Otus ireneae Ripley, 1966: ...
The Pemba scops owl is a medium-sized scops-owl with short ear-tufts. There are two colour morphs, a brown morph which is mainly pale rufous-brown with light streaking on the head and faint barring on paler underparts and a rufous morph which is a bright, rich rufous, that is paler on the underwing coverts.
A very small scops owl which is heavily streaked and barred on its pale sandy-grey upperparts, paler underparts with darker shaft streaks and fine, dark barring. The plain facial disc has vague margins and the shoulder stripe is not as conspicuous as in other scops owls and are sandy-coloured. The ear-tufts are very small and the eyes are yellow.
The taxonomy is in a state of flux but recent genetic studies have placed the Pemba scops owl closer to the clade containing the African scops owl Otus sengalensis, while the Mayotte scops owl is clearly separate from the remaining two.
The Flores scops owl (Otus alfredi) is an owl endemic to the island of Flores, Indonesia. It is threatened by habitat loss. This owl is around 19–21 cm from head to tail. They are a forest dwelling owl that is smallish in size. Some 250–2,499 individuals are estimated to be extant in the wild, dwindling due to habitat loss.
The sandy scops owl is thought to be basal in the lineage of the genus Otus, along with the Sokoke scops owl (Otus ireneae), but there has been no genetic material for testing from the sandy scops owl. [3] In addition, some authorities consider that the subspecies of sandy scops owl should be treated as two different species. [4]