Barn Owl Skull Ears

The barn owl has acute hearing with ears placed asymmetrically.

Barn owl skull ears.

Its ears are slightly offset which is thought to aid the bird in localizing its prey at night. For instance the barn owl has amazingly keen hearing that can detect the sound of prey under snow leaves or grass. The barn owl has a distinctive appearance with a white heart shaped face with no ear tufts and sharp black eyes. In a barn owl the left ear left opening is higher than the right so a sound coming from below the owl s line of sight will be louder in the right ear.

The ears are located at the sides of the head behind the eyes and are covered by the feathers of the facial disc. It is also known by many names such as white owl monkey faced owl silver owl demon owl ghost owl death owl night owl rat owl church. After doing some more research online it seems that the offset ears are primarily found in owls that are nocturnal hunters. Barn owl the difference in loudness also helps to specify elevation because of an unusual asymmetry in the owl s ears.

The right ear and its opening are direct ed slightly upward. Studies have shown that the barn owl is able to catch prey in zero light depending entirely on its sense of hearing. This improves detection of sound position and distance and the bird does not require sight to hunt. Owls are birds from the order strigiformes ˈ s t r ɪ dʒ ɪ f ɔːr m iː z which includes over 200 species of mostly solitary and nocturnal birds of prey typified by an upright stance a large broad head binocular vision binaural hearing sharp talons and feathers adapted for silent flight.

The left ear and its opening are directed downward. This is supposed to help the owl detect the location of prey due to the tiny time difference in which the sound reaches each ear. This striking appearance of the bird is complemented by the rich apricot plumage covering the bird s head back and outer wings. One ear is located higher in the skull than the other.

The ear tufts visible on some species are not ears at all but simply display feathers. The temporal lobes of the owls were then removed from the skulls post fixed in 1 osmium tetroxide dehydrated then embedded in araldite to study the anatomy of the inner ear. For this reason the right ear is more sensitive to sounds from above and the left ear to sounds from below. Barn owl ears are hidden in the feathers at the side of the face one ear is higher than the other.

Specifically i have found that barn owls left ear is higher than the right. Unlike other owls that hoot the sound made by the barn owl can be described more as a hiss or a snort. This study revealed that the basilar papilla of barn owls has two very unique features being a proliferation of lenticular cells and a thickening of the basilar membrane. The shape of the ear opening known as the aperture depends on the species of owl in some species the opening has a valve called an operculum covering it.

Because owls are generally active at night they have a highly developed auditory hearing system. During flight the left ear captures sounds below whilst the right ear focuses on sounds from above.