The Spotted Wood Owl is a richly colored medium-sized owl with a large rounded head, no ear-tufts and dark eyes. Its range is strangely disjunct; it occurs in many regions surrounding Borneo, but not on that island itself.
The facial disc is orange-buff. Eyes are dark brown, bill is greyish to greenish-black, and cere is greenish-black. The head is chocolate-brown with feathers that have golden bases and white spots with black edges that become bar-shaped on the nape. The upperparts are overall rufous chocolate-brown, profusely spotted with black-edged white spots. The mantle, back and uppertail-coverts are paler chocolate-brown, with black-margined white bars and spots. The outer webs of the scapulars are white or buffish with dark bars and blackish edges. The primaries are brownish, the outer ones having narrow incomplete bars on the outer webs.
The chin is buff, with a large white patch on the throat. The rest of the underparts are buff, barred black and white, the white bands being broader.
Thighs and feathered Tarsi are white, washed with buff and barred with black. Toes are feathered, and coloured dark olive, with horn-coloured claws.
The three subspecies are:
Strix seloputo seloputo – South Myanmar and central Thailand to Singapore. Also Jambi (Sumatra) and Java.
Strix seloputo baweana – Endemic to Bawean Island off North Java
Strix seloputo wiepkini – Calamian Islands and Palawan (Philippines)
Source: wikipedia, The Owl Pages
