Principe scops owl

The Príncipe scops owl (Otus bikegila) is a bird that lives on an island called Príncipe in São Tomé and Príncipe.

Home

The owl lives in old-growth forests.  There is about 15 square kilometers of old growth forest left on Principe, and about 1000-1500 Principe scops owls live there.  Its call sounds like "tuu." They start calling as soon as the sun goes down.

Discovery
Scientists thought this bird was there since 1928.  They became pretty sure it was there in 1997.  In July 2016, someone took a photograph of an unknown Otus owl on Príncipe. The image was published on Ornithomedia. People had heard Otus owls calling there since the early 1900s, but no one had been sure.  In 2022, scientists caught a few owls and wrote the first formal paper describing it.  They named it Otus bikegila. In 2022, scientists wrote the first paper saying exactly what it looked like.

Name

Scientists named this bird after a park ranger named Ceciliano do Bom Jesus. "Bikegila" is his nickname.

Threats

The scientists who wrote about the bird asked the IUCN to name it critically endangered because its home is so small and because human beings want to make a hydroelectric dam in part of the forest where it lives.  As of 2022, the IUCN has not made a report on this bird yet.

References

Category:Birds of Africa
Category:Strigiformes