Ajmal Thaha saw and photographed a Pharaoh
Eagle Owl on 11 November. It is uncommon in the Saudi Arabian deserts but they
Ajmal went to the Hejazi desert around
50 km from Jeddah and found one. The Pharaoh Eagle Owl is distributed
throughout much of North Africa and the Middle East, with two recognised
subspecies. The subspecies Bubo
ascalaphus ascalaphus occupies the northern part of the species range,
being found in Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, northern Egypt and Israel east
to western Iraq. By contrast, the smaller, paler and sandier coloured Bubo ascalaphus desertorum can be found
in the Sahara Desert south to Mauritania & Niger and from Western Sahara,
east, to Sudan, as well as in Eritrea, Ethiopia and much of the Arabian
Peninsula, as far south as northern Oman and as far east as southern Iraq. They
are found in arid habitats, including open desert plains, rocky outcrops and
broken escarpments and jabals, mountain cliffs and wadis. Most records from
Saudi Arabia have been attributed to the pale B. a. desertorum but there appear to be many birds resembling the
sub-species B. a. ascalaphus. I thank Ajmal for allowing me to use his photograph on my website
which is shown below.
