Shelley’s Eagle Owl also known as Bubo shelleyi is a member of the Owl family strigidae. Despite its size, it is a very little-known, rare and rarely studied owl. It is a rarely studied owl and has been found in very few. In the year 2021, wild specimens were photographed for the first time in the Atewa Forest Reserve in the region of south-eastern Ghana.
Highlights
This owl is considered to be the largest eagle owl in the world. The owl is about 61 cm long and the wing tendons are about 5 cm. They weigh about 1.25 kilograms. However, this eagle owl is larger than the dark eagle owl.
Features
The color of the Shelley?s Eagle Owl is dark brown. The bottom of the owl is white. Nocturnal bird eyes are dark brown. The tail feathers and wind feathers are colored brown. The owl hatchery has a large white area around its head. The Sherry Eagle Owl is the only heavy, thorny owl in Africa. All other large eagle owls that are common in different parts of the world, such as the Fraser?s eagle owl, Akun eagle owl and Verreaux?s Eagle owl are all smaller than the sherry eagle owl. The Sherry Eagle Owl is trapped in the woods. Unlike other eagle owls, it was not seen outside the forest.
Habitat of Shelley’s Eagle Owl
This species occurs in Central and West Africa. It was found in a widely dispersed area, probably isolated from habitat destruction. The isolated population is thought to live not only in small areas of inland Liberia, but also in the south-eastern tip of Sierra Leone, south-eastern Guinea and western Cte d’Ivoire. The isolated population can stay in one place in southern Ghana. Perhaps the largest population is found throughout southern Cameroon (probably the southernmost tip of Nigeria), most offshore of Equatorial Gabon and Guinea, the northern and southern parts of the Republic of the Congo, and most of the northern Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Behaviour of the owl
These owls generally roost on dense leaves. They are found in low trees. Their call sounds like kooouw, which is very different from other large eagle owls.
Conservation
IUCN listed them as “Near Threatened Species” until the year 2004. Then, in the year 2018, it was raised to “vulnerable”. There is no complete study of the Shelley?s Eagle Owl and just 20 collected specimens are there. They are threatened by habitat loss. The destruction of Congo’s rainforests and Guinean forests is the greatest threat to owls.
