Scavenging by young tortoises (Testudo sp.) could induce their predation by the Eurasian Eagle-Owl (Bubo bubo)

Boyan Milchev

doi:10.2478/orhu-2023-0034

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Scavenging by young tortoises (Testudo sp.) could induce their predation by the Eurasian Eagle-Owl (Bubo bubo)

Ornis Hungarica

Volume 31 (2023): Issue 2 (December 2023)

By: Boyan Milchev

Open Access

|Dec 2023

Abstract

Eating owl pellets by non-predator vertebrates is a rare and difficult-to-prove food chain relationship. In this paper, I reported the first record of a Spur-thighed Tortoise (Testudo graeca) eating a Eurasian Eagle-Owl (Bubo bubo) pellet with remains of a right Wood Pigeon (Columba palumbus) wing. Scavenging of food remains around owl nests by young tortoises may possibly explain the few cases of tortoise-eating Eurasian Eagle-Owls.

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