The tawny owl (Strix aluco) is an opportunistic and generalized predator. Peak hunting activity tends to occur largely between dusk to midnight, with owls often following an erratic hunting pattern, perhaps to sites where previous hunts were successful.Galeotti, P. (2001). Strix aluco Tawny Owl. Birds of Western Palearctic. Update, 3(1), 43–77.Redpath, S. M. (1995). Impact of habitat fragmentation on activity and hunting behavior in the tawny owl, Strix aluco. Behavioral Ecology, 6(4), 410–413. When feeding young, hunting may need to be prolonged into daylight in the early morning.Hirons, G.J.R. (1976). A population study of the Tawny Owl Strix aluco) and its main prey species in woodland. D. Phil Thesis, University of Oxford.Brown, R.H. (1936). Tawny Owl taking prey during the day. British Birds 30, 173–4.Hardy, A.R. (1977). Hunting ranges and feeding ecology of owls in farmland. Ph.D. thesis, Aberdeen University. Based on hand-reared young owls that re-released into the wild, hunting behaviour is quite innate rather than learned.Bennett, J. A., & Routh, A. D. (2000). Post-release survival of hand-reared tawny owls (Strix aluco). Animal Welfare, 9(3), 317–321. Normally this owl hunts from a perch. Perching bouts usually last from about 8 to 14 minutes depending largely on habitat. Tawny owl's hunting from a perch or pole can recall a buzzard and the two take similar prey sizes as well. However, high initial speed and maneuvering among trees and bushes with great dexterity may allow it to surprise relatively large prey, more like a goshawk. The tawny owl is capable of lifting and carrying off in flight individual prey weighing up to at least .Bernhoft-Osa, A. (1973). Hvor tungt bytte klarer rovfuglene å fly avsted med. Sterna, 12, 73–83. Their middle talon, the most enlarged claw on owls, measures an average of . While not as large as those of the Ural owl, the talons are extremely sharp, stout and quite decurved. The claws are considered to be visibly more overdeveloped than those of other European mid-sized owls and the footspan including the claws is somewhat larger as well, at an average of about .Martinez, J.A., Zuberogoitia, I. & Alonso, R. (2002). Guía para la determinación de la edad y el sexo en las estrigiformes ibéricas- CÁRABO COMÚN TAWNY OWL Strix aluco. Monticola: 95–102. The hunting owl often extends its wings to balance and control prey upon impact.Meinerzhagen, R. (1959). Pirates and Predators: The piratical and predatory habits of birds. Oliver & Boyd Alternatively, this species may hunt from flight. This occurs from over the ground, often over open habitats such as bushes, marsh or grassland, forming a quartering or zigzag pattern over the opening. During these flights they cover about before changing direction.Nilsson, I. N. (1978). Hunting in flight by Tawny Owls Strix aluco. Ibis, 120(4), 528–531. Hunting from flight was surprisingly prevalent in a Swedish study of two radio-tagged birds, with 34% of study time spent hunting from flight while 40% of the study time was spent on hunting from a perch. In a similar study in England, less than 1% of time was spent hunting from flight. In a more deliberate variation of hunting from flight, the hunting owl may examine crags and nest boxes or also hover around prey roosts. In the latter type of hunts, the tawny owls may strike branches and/or beat their wings together in front of denser foliage, bushes or conifers in order to disturb and flush prey such as small birds and bats, or may dive directly into said foliage.Uttendorfer, O. (1939). Die Ernahrung der Deutschen Raub- vogel und Eulen und ihre Bedeutung in der Heimischer. Natur. Verl. Neumann, Neudamm.Fitter, R. S. R. (1949). London's birds. Collins. Hovering has also been recorded in differing circumstances, including one incidence of an owl hunting a small bird that was caught on the wing after a hovering flight.Ruthke, P. (1935). Uber das Rutteln des Walkauzes. Beitr. Fortpfl. Biol. Vogel, 12: 79.Mather, J. (1979). Tawny Owl taking Juvenile Sand Martin in Flight. British Birds, 72(11), 552–552. Tawny owls have also taken bats on the wing as well (such as ones snatched from near streep lamps when attempting to hunt themselves) and have been seen to hawk large, relatively slow-flying insects such as some beetles and moths in flight. Caterpillars may too be taken from trees. Usually these hunting variations are correlated with poor weather hampering the capture of preferred prey.Snow, D. W. (1958). A study of blackbirds. British Museum of Natural. Tawny owls eat worms with relative frequency, as they often hear them apparently from below the surface and snatch them up from shallow dirt or below leaf litter. Their worm-hunting style recalls worm hunting techniques by most other birds and they were recorded to eat 0.39 worms per minute during an hour of observation in England and were sometimes seen to feed on worms during daylight.Beven, G. (1965). The food of Tawny Owls in London. London Bird Reports, 29: 56–72.Macdonald, D. W. (1976). Nocturnal observations of tawny owls Strix aluco preying upon earthworms. Ibis, 118(4), 579–580.Macdonald, D. W. (1983). Predation on earthworms by terrestrial vertebrates. In Earthworm ecology (pp. 393–414). Springer, Dordrecht. Other hunting from the ground has been observed, often of insects such as beetles, but tawny owls have also been reported to "leap" upon from a ground vantage point in order to capture a vole, quite like foxes often do.Schnurre, O. (1934). Ernährung und Jagdbeute des Waldkauzes im Berliner Tiergarten. Beitr. Fortpflanzungsbiol. Vög, 10, 206–213.Schneider, W. (1979). Zur mannigfaltigen Fangmethode des Wadkauzes. Beitr. Vogelkd, 25: 364. There are now many accounts of tawny owls feeding on carrion from a wide range of sources, including hares, rats, sheep, and trout.Robert, E.L. (1944). Tawny Owl taking carrion. British Birds, 38: 56.Gruzdev, L.V. & Likhachev, G.N. (1960). Contribution to feeding habits of Strix aluco in the Tula Zaseki. Zoologicheskii Zhurnal 39: 624–627 (in Russian with English summary).Vásárhelyi, I. (1967). Aquila, 73: 196.Kochan, W. (1979). Acta Zool. Cracovia, 23: 213–46.
Upon capture, small prey like shrews and rodents are often swallowed whole, while others may be torn into pieces. Often prey is dismembered in order to more easily ingest it whole, i.e. decapitating mice, removing the legs from frogs while birds like sparrows are also regularly decapitated (with the head often eaten separately) and nearly all avian prey is plucked before being consumed.Raber, H. (1950). Animal Behaviour, 2.Thiollay, J. M. (1963). Les pelotes de quelques rapaces. Nos oiseaux, 26(289–290), 124–131.Bütikofer, E (1909). Der Waldkauz. Orn. Beob. 7: 37–40. One tawny owl was observed to eat a squirrel by leaving the head intact and peeling the skin back from the neck, apparently leaving bones in place while consuming the flesh.de Brichambaut, J.P. (1978). Mode de dépouillement de mammifères moyens par deux rapaces. Alauda, 46 : 271: 27. Indigestible items, including fur, feathers, bones (which sometimes visibly protrude out of the peller), sometimes intestines and invertebrate carapaces, are regurgitated in large pellets, that can be anywhere in typical size from long with a diameter of . The pellets are typically grey coloured and are found in groups under trees used for roosting or nesting. At least some tawny owl pellets can measure up to long and can include large objects such as an intact bill of a snipe. Undigested material coughed up often reveals different prey than pellets. Estimated daily food requirements for a tawny owl is , which is proportionately lower (at about 14% of their own body mass) than the estimates for other medium-sized owls in Europe (at 23–26% of their own body mass), therefore tawny owls can appear to live off of relatively little food quite efficiently.
Prey spectrum