Mottled Owl

Ciccaba virgata

The mottled owl is a medium-sized owl found in Central and South America from Mexico to Brazil and Argentina. The head and back are mottled brown and the underparts whitish, with vertical bars on the chest and throat. The eyes are dark and the head is round and they do not have ear tufts. They are territorial and found in dry forests and jungles at altitudes of up to 2,500 m (8,200 ft) above sea level. Source

Where it is now

In the last 8 weeks this bird was recorded 20,144 times across 20 areas (each area is a 5 degree square).

See the Mottled Owl on the live map

Movement and weather

Each season it is first heard regularly where daytime highs are around 30°C (typically 26 to 30°C, from 6 areas). That holds across 45° of latitude, which suggests its timing follows temperature more than the calendar.

Over the weeks it was present in the past year, its centre in South America ranged from 8°S in April to 7°N in February, about 1,700 km apart.

Arrival dates

The week it was first heard regularly in each region, after at least six weeks away. Dates differ from south to north, so a region has a range.

Download every area as CSV

Figures are effort corrected and come from automatic sound identification, which makes mistakes. How this is measured and how it compares with human observers.