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The UK Bird Atlas

Scops Owl (Otus scops)Where and when to see it in the UK

Scarce migrant · reporting peaks December · Owls · BOU category A

Records to 2026-08-16 · build 2026-08-31

Scops Owl (Otus scops)
Frank Vassen from Brussels, Belgium, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Too few records to rate squares by month. Each marked square has at least one record; the table below gives the count and years.

Scops Owl: relative reporting rate by 10 km square, September

Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026 (grid squares, place names from OS Open Names). Northern Ireland place names: OSNI Open Data, OGL v3.0. County and country boundaries: Office for National Statistics, Open Government Licence v3.0. Coastline: Natural Earth. Bird records from the data partners listed here.

Scops Owl has been recorded in 12 of the 2,971 10 km squares covering UK land (0%) in records to 2026. Scarce migrant in the UK. Reporting peaks in December.

Conservation status: Least Concern (IUCN Red List, LC)
View on the IUCN Red List

Records by 10 km square

SquareWhereRecordsYearsVerified
SS69Swansea, Wales12025unverified
SS59Swansea, Wales12025unverified
TR36Kent, England352024unverified
NZ45Sunderland, England572017unverified
SP41Oxfordshire, England562006 to 2016unverified
HY75Sea, off Orkney Islands12014unverified
SO80Gloucestershire, England22006unverified
HU46Shetland Islands, Scotland12006unverified
HZ27Shetland Islands, Scotland22003unverified
HP61Shetland Islands, Scotland12003unverified
SW32Cornwall, England102002unverified
HU42Shetland Islands, Scotland12001unverified

Spotted an error in a square? Report it and it goes into the review queue. Read the methodology for how classes, flags and sensitive-species rules work. Data to 2026.