This large owl lives among rocks in dry country and searches for prey at night.
It has short ear tufts, orange-yellow eyes and a cat-like facial appearance.
The Desert Eagle Owl is a large owl of arid country. Before this study, published Iraqi records were limited to a few western desert localities, and no occurrence in Iran had been reported. Using field observations and photographs, Al-Sheikhly and colleagues confirmed records from western through southeastern Iraq and western Iran during 2017–2020. This is a distribution study, not a population survey.
In Iraq, adults were observed at Ur’s ruins and Jabal Sanam’s cliffs in 2017, and in the Zagros foothills near Iran in 2018. In western Iran, adults were photographed at two Khuzestan sites in 2020. The authors report trapping during Iraq’s February–June breeding season: adults were caught in nets and young taken from nesting cavities for sale in local markets.
An extinction-risk assessment has not been added yet.
The authors say the owl’s survival status in Iraq and Iran is not fully known and warrants monitoring. In Iraq, they report adults trapped and young taken from nesting holes during the February–June breeding season, then offered in local animal markets as cage birds.