eagle owls in Britian, r they a threat?

[Bumbledor]

Are eagle owls settling in Britain?

Ian Sample
Thursday December 11, 2003
The Guardian

Yes, but not in big numbers. Reports this week claimed that a number of
eagle owls had escaped from zoos on the continent and flown here to set up
home. But it is more likely they escaped or were released from homes and
aviaries in Britain.
Eagle owls (above), which have a wingspan just shy of two metres, are the
biggest in the world, dwarfing Britain's most common owl, the tawny, which
has a wingspan half the size. Experts suspect that the north of England and
the Scottish Highlands were home to a number of eagle owls that were brought
to the country in the 18th century only to escape into the wild. They were
wiped out when game-rearing estates started shooting them for taking their
birds.

Malcolm Ogilvie of the RSPB's rare breeding birds panel says there is at
least one breeding pair of eagle owls (known as Bubo Bubo after the deep
hooting sound they make) in the north. Since 1996, the pair have given birth
to 15 babies. One pair of owls is unlikely to trigger a burgeoning
population though, since fertility between the siblings is likely to be low.
It would take a second pair for the species to gain a foothold in Britain,
says Ogilvie, who estimates there are about 20 in the country.

Tony Warburton, director of the World Owl Trust, puts the growth in eagle
owl numbers down to the "Kes effect" after the 1969 Ken Loach film about a
boy who had a pet kestrel. The film spurred people's interest in keeping
birds of prey, he says, and since then there's been Harry Potter. "It
started with kestrels, but what could be better than walking into a pub with
the biggest owl in the world on your arm?" he says. The problem, he says, is
that people who bought eagle owls as pets soon realised they were hard to
handle and either lost or released them.

The arrival of eagle owls in Britain is not necessarily to be celebrated,
because they are so indiscriminate about the animals they prey on, says
Ogilvie. "They are voracious predators that will eat just about anything,"
he says. "We should be very wary because of the impact they can have, and
there's reason to believe it could be seriously bad."