Long Eared Owl Fine Art Print
A high quality fine art print on Hahnemühle German Etching art paper of a Long Eared Owl sitting on a fence post, painted by wildlife painter Charles Collins (c.1680-1744) on 5th April 1740.
Superb Long-Eared Owl Fine Art Print on Museum-Quality Paper
We've meticulously reproduced Long Eared Owl Fine Art Print on museum-quality fine art paper, matched to size. The 6in x 8in print is produced on Enhanced Matte Art Paper [EMA], a heavy-duty fine art paper with a smooth, non-reflective finish. The 12in x 16in and 18in x 24in prints are produced on 310gsm Hahnemühle German Etching paper [HGE], an acid and lignin-free archival paper with a fine tooth, offering our highest level of detail and longevity.
Both papers are fade-resistant and colourfast, using pigment inks designed to preserve the clarity and depth of the original artwork for decades. Every print is produced to order from a high-resolution master file, ensuring sharp detail and accurate colour reproduction.
* Please note that images of Long Eared Owl Fine Art Print on our website are lower resolution copies of the originals, for illustrative purposes only. The actual print uses high-resolution source imagery to ensure a crisp, clear, and visually stunning final result.
The Taylor White Collection's 18th Century Watercolour Painting of the Long-Eared Owl
Our Long-Eared Owl comes from the original collection of Taylor White F.R.S. (1701-1772). In the mid-18th Century, White commissioned the celebrated wildlife painter Charles Collins (c.1680 - 1744) to paint a number of specimens for his collection. The watercolour of the Long-Eared Owl was among the works Collins produced for White.
The original Long-Eared Owl watercolour is finely painted, with remarkable detail, allowing the plumage and features of the Long-Eared Owl to be seen in stunning clarity. This depth of colour and detail has been captured brilliantly through the digitisation process and is replicated here for your home or office decor, or as a thoughtful gift.
Taylor White, a barrister by profession and later Puisne Judge for Chester, was a keen naturalist and Fellow of the Royal Society, elected in 1725. Over nearly forty years from the 1730s until his death in 1772, he commissioned 938 watercolours of birds, mammals, fish and reptiles, including the Long-Eared Owl, now held at McGill University and painted almost entirely by two artists, Charles Collins and Peter Paillou. White was a founding governor of The Foundling Hospital in London and served as its treasurer for the last twenty-five years of his life. His well-connected social and scientific circle gave his artists exceptional access to specimens: his second wife, Frances Armstrong, was the daughter of General John Armstrong, Governor of the Tower of London and Chief Royal Engineer, and White's artists painted the lions, wolves and other animals of the Royal Menagerie there. He also borrowed specimens from the British Museum, and received rare and exotic birds from friends, including the naturalist Joseph Banks, who sailed to Newfoundland in 1766, and William Harrison, who brought back specimens from voyages testing his father's marine chronometer.
The Long-Eared Owl
The Long-Eared Owl, Asio otus, is one of the more distinctive raptors to appear in the Taylor White Collection, its long, upright ear tufts and piercing orange eyes lending it an unmistakable, almost feline expression. This 18th Century watercolour was painted by Charles Collins on 5th April 1740, capturing the species with the close observational detail characteristic of his natural history work.
Description of the Long-Eared Owl
Also known historically as the Northern Long-Eared Owl or, more evocatively, the Cat Owl, this medium-sized owl has one of the widest distributions of any owl species, found across North America, Europe, North Africa and Central Asia. It favours partially open habitats, particularly woodland edges bordering fields or heathland, where dense tree cover offers daytime roosting and concealment while adjacent open ground provides productive hunting territory.
About The Long-Eared Owl
Rather than building its own nest, the Long-Eared Owl typically takes over the abandoned nests of other birds, most often crows, magpies or birds of prey, adapting an existing structure to its own needs. Its diet consists predominantly of small rodents, with voles forming the bulk of its intake, though it will turn to small birds and insects when rodent numbers decline.
This watercolour forms part of the Taylor White Collection, a body of 18th Century natural history illustrations with provenance to McGill University Library, prized today for the scientific precision and quiet elegance that artists such as Charles Collins brought to their subjects.
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