Arabian Scops Owl

In the summer months, the Dhofar region of southern Oman benefits from the Southwest Monsoon. The skies become overcast, and the hillsides turn lush and green. Several species that are best known from Africa, such as Bruce’s Green Pigeon Treron waalia, Diederik Cuckoo Chrysococcyx caprius and Grey-headed Kingfisher Halcyon leucocephala arrive for the wet season to breed. To the north and east, 700 km of barren desert form a barrier preventing these species spreading any further. Other African specialities stay there all year round, such as Black-crowned Tchagra Tchagra senegala and African Paradise Flycatcher Terpsiphone viridis. So it is hardly surprising that, until very recently, two of the owls of this region were treated as subspecies of widespread African species. 

When George Latimer Bates (1937b) described Arabian Scops Owl Otus pamelae, he classified it as a subspecies of African Scops Owl O senegalensis, although his formal description only mentioned differences, not similarities to that species. The type series of specimens on which he based his description came from Wadi Bisha in south-western Saudi Arabia (Bates 1937a). Some locals had given an adult and three fledglings to Harry St John Philby, an Arabist, explorer and writer known to them as ‘Sheikh Abdullah’. Philby was also a British spy and incidentally the father of Kim Philby, later a notorious double agent and member of ‘the Cambridge Five’. It was at Philby senior’s suggestion that Bates named the new subspecies pamelae. His club in London, the Athenaeum club, had an owl as its emblem and one Pamela Lovibond was its librarian. 

Arabian Scops Owl is a widespread resident in ‘Arabia Felix’, the part of Arabia blessed with the highest rainfall and the most fertile land. In southern Oman and much of Yemen, it occurs in Common Myrrh Commiphora myrrha and ‘acacia’ scrub. In the mountainous Asir region of Saudi Arabia it lives on dry wooded slopes, in lush vegetation and Ficus thickets, as well as montane juniper forest. Most sites are close to a freshwater source (Jennings 2010). African Scops Owl breeds as close as Eritrea, just across the Red Sea, and in Somalia, which is just across the Gulf of Aden.

CD2-49 is a typical male Arabian Scops Owl, recorded in Dhofar in April. He hoots at intervals of nine seconds, about three times slower than Eurasian Scops Owl. The pitch is slightly lower than in Eurasian Scops but much higher than in Pallid Scops Owl O brucei.

Arabian Scops Owls in Dhofar start breeding in autumn, when Eurasian Scops Owl and some Pallid Scops Owl are migrating south. The majority of callers have been reported from September to November, with some from December to February and April, suggesting that most breeding takes place there after the Southwest Monsoon and may continue until April (Jennings 2010). Elsewhere, in Yemen and Saudi Arabia, breeding is more in line with other northern hemisphere birds (Bates 1937a, Jennings 2010).

A wide expanse of desert separates the sedentary Arabian Scops Owl from the breeding range of Pallid Scops Owl in northern Oman. Some Pallid Scops do arrive in Dhofar and Yemen during the ‘winter’, although they probably come from Central Asia (Jennings 2010). Eurasian Scops Owls are regular migrants in Oman, with most individuals probably continuing on into Africa.

Arnoud spent several nights in Dhofar at the start of the monsoon in July. The owls were not very vocal, but at least there was nobody to disturb his efforts. It was the month of Ramadan, so nearly everybody was spending the evenings with family. The rain and high humidity bring millions of biting insects to Wadi Darbat, but with stoical perseverance Arnoud managed to make both photographs and sound recordings of one particular male. Its hoots were slightly higher-pitched than the one in CD2-50, and delivered at slightly shorter intervals of 7.9 seconds. 

It is unrecorded whether St John Philby told George Bates about any sounds he may have heard from Arabian Scops Owl. Its hooting does actually sound very similar to that of African Scops Owl. Both species have single-note hoots with a buzzing timbre caused by rapid modulations. There is only one African Scops in our own sound collection, but as of 11 June 2014 you can listen to 17 at the online archive www.xeno-canto.org. Previous authors have noted that African Scops has lower-pitched, shorter hoots than Arabian Scops (König et al 2008, Pons et al 2013), and you can hear this in CD2-51. Most other African Scops conform to this pattern, although of the 17 on Xeno-canto, two from Zambia are as high-pitched as Arabian  Scops and one from Ghana has hoots that are just as long. I have indicated some other differences in the sonagrams.

Hooting of female Arabian Scops Owls is similar to that of males but quieter. In CD2-52, the male hoots first, then the female joins in and they form a duet. Surprisingly for a female owl, she is lower-pitched than the male. In CD2-53, recorded a couple of minutes later, the same female uses twiu soliciting calls that are very similar to those of Eurasian Scops Owl. CD2-54 starts with the male hooting and the female giving twiu calls, but ends with copulation. The male gives a high-pitched twitter while the female gives a few very short notes that may be related to the croaking call of Eurasian Scops (CD2-54). 

Excitement calls of Arabian Scops Owl follow the classic Otus blueprint, although they seem to be unusually variable in pitch and timbre. The calls in CD2-55 for example are lower-pitched and harsher than those in CD2-56. During our visits in February, April and July, these calls were common.

Arabian Scops Owl has a much longer wing than African Scops Owl, and this was what convinced Bates that pamelae was a new taxon. Its plumage is also much paler with less prominent streaks on the breast and a less distinct scapular stripe. The two species are genetically distinct, with a 4% difference in mtDNA. They are not even each other’s closest relatives (Pons et al 2013). Arabian Scops Owl branched off earliest, followed by Eurasian Scops Owl and two island species from either side of Africa, leaving African Scops as the most recently evolved species. 

Much remains to be discovered about Arabian Scops Owl. We did not manage to record any juvenile sounds, for instance. We would love to have recorded a larger repertoire but events elsewhere in Arabia, described in the final chapter, stole our attention during the final year of fieldwork for this book. Perhaps somebody else would like to take up the challenge.