Tytonidae – Barn & Grass Owls

Owls, my favourite birds
by Friedhelm Weick

Owls are outstanding birds! Is it their silent hunting in the poor evening light and at night, their distinctive appearance – huge head and forward looking eyes or maybe the echoes of ancient myths and tales of woodland goblins and bewitched owl-shaped princesses? However, since my childhood owls were my favourite birds. They even outranked my ambition for the diurnal birds of prey. As a wildlife artist, birder and ornithologists – I never lost my contact to these feather-armoured knights of the twilight. When in 1980 my book Birds of Prey of the World (Parey, Berlin) was printed, I had the idea for a similar project on the strigiformes of the world. So I began to collect every bit of information about this subject – and, remember: the Internet wasn’t in reach for the common wildlife artist then.

I filed scientific articles, photos and colour-copies of books, sketches and other descriptions back to 1758, photos from living owls in the wildlife or captivity. Detailed lists of measures and colours of skins, weights and feathers grew larger and larger. Beside that I visited zoological gardens, ornithological institutes and a lot of private owl-keepers, birders and ornithologists. In the early nineties I wrote three different annotated checklists about Strigiformes. The first included all recent complete taxa and their distribution. A second listed all-important measurements and weights linked to an index of photos and paintings. The third list was a full description of plumages and soft parts combined with a detailed bibliography.

In this situation Claus König head of the Natural Science Museum at Stuttgart and ambitioned ornithologist asked me if I would be interested in a project which should result in nothing minor than the standard guide to all owls of the world. The publisher would be Pica Press, Sussex. Of course I was, wasn’t I?

The three checklists were the basic-stock for our further work. In the following years I examined some thousands of skins and mounted owls in all-important museums of the world, only supported by my dear wife Christel. Within nearly three years I painted all different taxa and morphes that were sometimes known only by one skin…

In 1999 the book was published… leaving me more time for birding and outdoor projects and, last but not least for new paintings of my favourite birds, guess which?