page_title: Western barn owl
section_title: Lifespan
hierarchical_section_title: Western barn owl / Behaviour and ecology / Lifespan
caption_attribution_description: Español: Una lechuza común (Tyto alba) a punto de posarse sobre la mano del cetrero. English: A barn owl (Tyto alba) just about to pose on the falconer's hand.
context_page_description: The western barn owl is usually considered a subspecies group and together with the American barn owl group, the eastern barn owl group, and sometimes the Andaman masked owl make up the barn owl. The cosmopolitan barn owl is recognized by most taxonomic authorities. A few separate them into distinct species, as is done here. The western barn owl is native to Eurasia and Africa.
context_section_description: Unusually for such a medium-sized carnivorous animal, the barn owl exhibits r-selection, producing large number of offspring with a high growth rate, many of which have a relatively low probability of surviving to adulthood. While wild barn owls are thus decidedly short-lived, the actual longevity of the species is much higher – captive individuals may reach twenty years of age or more. But occasionally, a wild bird reaches an advanced age. A Dutch owl was noted to have reached an age of seventeen years, ten months. Another captive barn owl, in England, lived to be over twenty-five years old. Taking into account such extremely long-lived individuals, the average lifespan of the barn owl is about four years, and statistically two-thirds to three-quarters of all adults survive from one year to the next. However, the mortality is not evenly distributed throughout the bird's life, and only one young in three manages to live to its first breeding attempt.
  The most significant cause of death in temperate areas is likely to be starvation, particularly over the autumn and winter period when first year birds are still perfecting their hunting skills. In northern and upland areas, there is some correlation between mortality in older birds and adverse weather, deep-lying snow and prolonged low temperatures. Collision with road vehicles is another cause of mortality, and may result when birds forage on mown verges. Some of these birds are in poor condition and may have been less able to evade oncoming vehicles than fit individuals would have been. Historically, many deaths were caused by the use of pesticides, and this may still be the case in some parts of the world. Collisions with power-lines kill some birds and shooting accounts for others, especially in Mediterranean regions.
caption: Landing on a handler's gloved hand. Captive birds often live longer than wild ones.
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon EOS 5D Mark III", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5.6 (Windows)", "Image DateTime": "2014:10:28 13:53:46", "Image Artist": "Carlos Delgado", "Image ExifOffset": "2326", "Image XPAuthor": "Carlos Delgado", "Image Padding": "[]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "5070", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "5113", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/8000", "EXIF FNumber": "4", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Aperture Priority", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "320", "EXIF SensitivityType": "Recommended Exposure Index", "EXIF RecommendedExposureIndex": "320", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0230", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2014:10:18 12:32:00", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2014:10:18 12:32:00", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "1620723/125000", "EXIF ApertureValue": "4", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "-1/3", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "4", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "350", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "25", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "25", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "1600", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "1600", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "3", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF BodySerialNumber": "013021001252", "EXIF LensSpecification": "[200, 400, 0/0, 0/0]", "EXIF LensModel": "EF200-400mm f/4L IS USM", "EXIF LensSerialNumber": "0800000171", "EXIF Padding": "[]"}