Incestuous behavior in Spotted Owls

Inbreeding of closely related individuals can be referred to as incest, gen erally limited to parent-offspring or sibling pairs. Cases of incest in rap tors are rarely reported because they require long term monitoring of marke d individuals. We documented 3 cases of close inbreeding among 730 pairs of individually marked Spotted Owls (Strix occidentalis) across all 3 subspec ies during 14 years of study. The incestuous pairings we observed may be th e result of shorter than normal dispersal distances and chance encounters. Although the level of incest appears to be low in Spotted Owls, the level o f actual inbreeding remains unknown.