Does English have different words for different-looking owls? [closed]

Question

French has le hibou and la chouette for owls with and without little tufty ears, German has der Kauz, der Uhu and die Eule for a similar (but not identical) distinction, Spanish has la lechuza and el búho.

Does English have a similar words for owls that look different (not the species name, but based on some shared characteristic)?

Answer 1

No, English has no specific word for owls based on this characteristic.

Terms for this feature in owls:

• Ear tuft [wikipedia], most widely-used
• Plumicorns [Merriam Webster Dictionary], in zoology
• Egret [Oxford English Dictionary], although this term more commonly refers to the species Egrets
  • A tuft of feathers such as that borne by the Egret and some other birds; a spray of gems, or similar ornament, worn on the head.
• Horn [Wordnik], when referring specifically to birds
  • Specifically— A feeler; a tentacle; an antenna; an ovipositor; also, the tuft of feathers upon the head of sundry birds, resembling a horn; a plumicorn, as that of various owls.
• Corniplume [Free Dictionary], rarely

So what does an English-speaker call the collective of owls with this feature?

"Owls with ear tufts" (or any synonym you prefer) is clearest.

You will also be understood if you refer to "Tufted owls" or "Horned owls", but this may give the implication you are referring to specific species such as the Long-Tufted Screech Owl or the Great Horned Owl depending on context.

Answer 2

As others have said, English has no specific (single) words for different-looking owls. However, we use compound names for different-looking owls.

According to The Spruce, there are more than 225 owl species in the world, divided into two families.

Barn owls with their distinct heart-shaped facial disks make up the Tytonidae family, while all other owl species are in the Strigidae or typical owl family.

Alphabetical List of Owl Species Sorted by Common Name:

Names with * -> Considered threatened or vulnerable due to population decreases and growing survival threats.

Names with** -> Listed as endangered and in critical danger of extinction if conservation is not implemented (Classifications by BirdLife International).

Tytonidae Owls

• African Grass-Owl (Tyto capensis)

• Ashy-Faced Owl (Tyto glaucops)

• Australian Masked-Owl (Tyto novaehollandiae)

• Common Barn-Owl (Tyto alba)

• **Congo Bay-Owl (Phodilus prigoginei)

• Eastern Grass-Owl (Tyto longimembris)

• *Golden Masked-Owl (Tyto aurantia)

• Greater Sooty-Owl (Tyto tenebricosa)

• Lesser Sooty-Owl (Tyto multipunctata)

• *Madagascar Red Owl (Tyto soumagnei) *Minahassa Masked-Owl (Tyto inexspectata)

• Oriental Bay-Owl (Phodilus badius)

• Seram Masked-Owl (Tyto almae) Sri Lanka Bay-Owl (Phodilus assimilis)

• Sulawesi Masked-Owl (Tyto rosenbergii)

• *Taliabu Masked-Owl (Tyto nigrobrunnea)

Strigidae Owls

• African Barred Owlet (Glaucidium capense)

• African Long-Eared Owl (Asio abyssinicus)

• African Scops-Owl (Otus senegalensis)

• African Wood-Owl (Strix woodfordii)

• Akun Eagle-Owl (Bubo leucostictus)

• *Albertine Owlet (Glaucidium albertinum)

• Amazonian Pygmy-Owl (Glaucidium hardyi)

• Andaman Boobook (Ninox affinis)

• Andaman Scops-Owl (Otus balli)

• Andean Pygmy-Owl (Glaucidium jardinii)

• **Anjouan Scops-Owl (Otus capnodes)

• **Annobon Scops-Owl (Otus feae)

• Arabian Scops-Owl (Otus pamelae)

• Asian Barred Owlet (Glaucidium cuculoides)

[The Spruce]

18 Owl Species With Irresistible Faces and English names By Jaymi Heimbuch - TreeHugger

Answer 3

There are two types of owl.

Wikipedia:

Owls are divided into two families: the true (or typical) owl family, Strigidae, and the barn-owl family, Tytonidae.

but there is no common distinction.

The situation in French, German, Spanish, etc is similar to the English names for the members of the bird family of thrushes: there is a blackbird, a robin, a redstart, a fieldfare, a redwing, etc. but they are all essentially thrushes.

Answer 4

Short answer, no, In English an owl is an owl, there are no other pronunciation for it. Here is a bit more detail.

Referenced from owl pages

The word owl originated in early European languages. In old Norse, an Owl was known as "ugla", and in old German, it was "uwila". Both of these words may have been created as sounds that described the unique call of an Owl

So the word owl seems to have been created to specifically describes the animal, by the sound it makes.

I will also drift off the point of the word owl a bit, simply to explain a bit about languages and the use of words and where they derived from.

This is the case in a lot of languages that derived from other languages. In most African languages, objects are named by the sound it makes or by what it looks like. The also use amend words from other languages by simply adding a letter to it. A very good example is in South Africa in the Zulu and Tswana language, the word Corona is simply transformed to iCorona which represents the way they construct their language.

Words across many languages were also adopted and adapted, even though a direct translation of the word from its derived language is not the same thing. Examples:

In English lemonis the sour fruit with a yellow skin found on trees during fall and winter. The Language Afrikaans adapted the word and made it lemoen but a lemoen is not a lemon but instead it is an orange. In Afrikaans, a Lemon is actually called a suur lemoen which directly translates to sour lemon.

That is why owl in other languages can have various words for the species, because these words better explain the difference between the birds, where instead in English, the difference of the bird is explained by the type of owl. i.e a Barn Owl is called that because it is mostly seen in and around barns on farms where it feeds of mice that nests in the "organized chaos" of sheds and barns.