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The Probability of Nesting Success of the Long-Eared Owl (Asio otus, Strigidae, Strigiformes, Aves) Is Determined by the Structure and Heterogeneity of the Breeding Habitat

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Abstract—From 2001 to 2020, for each long-eared owl nest on the territory of the Crane Homeland Nature Reserve with an area of 48 km2, the following microhabitat parameters were determined using standard field methods: the nest type built by different bird species, the presence of a nest roof, the nesting tree species, and the nest height above the ground. In most cases, for nesting the long-eared owl reused magpie nests (Pica pica) (77%) and half of the nests were found on willow trees (family Salicaceae) (50%). The nest height above the ground varied from 1.5 to 22 meters. Vegetation on the nesting area with a radius of 500 m was determined using the “Semi-Automatic Classification Plugin” automatic vegetation classifier of the QGIS software. Five habitat types were classified: forests, shrubs, meadows, arable land, and satellite image mistakes. Village areas were allocated separately. The average shares of the largest habitat types for over 20 years on the nesting sites included meadows (51.1%) and shrubs (16%). From 2001 to 2020, a habitat change in the nesting area was observed: forest and shrub areas decreased, while the meadow, village, and arable land areas increased. An analysis of the effect of habitat types on the nesting success was evaluated by means of the “gbm” and “dismo” modules in the R program using the Boosted Tree classifier algorithm. The presence of habitat types in the nesting site such as villages (24.2%), shrubs (19.3%), meadows (11.8%), and habitat heterogeneity (11.6%) most strongly affected the probability of nesting success of the owl. The reason that owls tend to use anthropogenic and agricultural territories is associated with the diversity, easy foraging, and more effective protection from predators during the breeding season.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors are grateful to O.S. Grinchenko for help in conducting research on the territory of the reserve; T.V. Sviridova, N.M. Rogova, and D.B. Koltsov for help in the classification of vegetation; and students and graduate students of Moscow State Pedagogical University and our colleagues in the Crane’s Homeland Reserve for their assistance in field research.

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This work was supported by ongoing institutional funding. No additional grants to carry out or direct this particular research were obtained.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Zoology and Ecology Department, Moscow State Pedagogical University, 129164, Moscow, Russia

    A. V. Sharikov & T. S. Kovinka

  2. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution, Russian Academy of Sciences, 119071, Moscow, Russia

    T. S. Massalskaia & S. V. Volkov

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Correspondence to A. V. Sharikov, T. S. Massalskaia, S. V. Volkov or T. S. Kovinka.

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Sharikov, A.V., Massalskaia, T.S., Volkov, S.V. et al. The Probability of Nesting Success of the Long-Eared Owl (Asio otus, Strigidae, Strigiformes, Aves) Is Determined by the Structure and Heterogeneity of the Breeding Habitat. Biol Bull Russ Acad Sci 50, 2302–2310 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1134/S1062359023090364

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