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Our daylight time is shorter by each day. The more we go towards winter the better are the chances to meet an Ural owl in a suitable lookout tree. It is a large bird with the gliding and soundless flight characteristic for owls. The female is nearly one third heavier than the male birds – but doesn’t quite reach one kilo in weight – and so also larger. Earlier they could only be seen in ancient conifer forests, now they have also settled in deciduous forests in western Estonia; only on the islands they are just stray visitors. They can be seen hunting at the borders of very different types of forests, bogs and marshes.

 

The Ural owl has a long body and tail and rather pale-coloured plumage. The dark eyes are circled in grey, the beak is yellow and the area under the beak grey. The legs are whitish, the claws black.