The Occupancy of Barn Owl in the Artificial Nest Box to Control Rice Field Rat in Yogyakarta Indonesia

Abstract

One component of integrated rat management in rice fields is barn owl as biological control. The study was conducted to evaluate the occupancy rate of barn owl nest boxes, the local rat population, and rat damage to rice crops. It was conducted in three locations in Yogyakarta by observing 10 nest boxes per site. Assessment of their occupancy was monitored by barn owl presence in nest box (egg, chick, and adult) and natural nests in villages nearby. In comparison with control village, the local rat population was observed by the active burrow count method and linear trap barrier systems. Rat damage intensity is estimated by sampling 150 tillers using a stratified sampling approach. The result indicated that 1-4 nest boxes were occupied per location. The owls also nested within buildings nearby. Active burrows ranged from 4 to 25 burrows per 150 m. The rat damage area ranged from 33.33% - 48.57% with 6.33% - 14.86% damage intensity was significantly lower than the control site. Artificial nest box installation for owls in rice fields were only occupied for breeding. The use of barn owls for biological control of rice field rats should be combined with other methods in an integrated approach.

The Evaluation of a Decade Barn Owl (Tyto alba) Introduction in Oil Palm Plantations Central Kalimantan

“…Various methods are applied in oil palm plantations for rat control, i.e., trapping techniques, protective guards, hunting, rat poisoning, and using natural enemies such as barn owls (Tyto alba). Currently, anticoagulant rodenticides are the most implemented in controlling the rat population in oil palm plantations [3] IOP Publishing doi:10.1088/1755-1315/1308/1/012019 2 [4,5]. However, in line with the sustainable palm oil industry commitment through the implementation of integrated pest management (IPM), anti-coagulant rodenticides have been used in combination with biological control using barn owls [6][7][8].…”

“…T. alba is one of the raptors that exists as a top predator in the food chain [5]. T. alba is a potential predator for rat control as it can prey on 2-5 rats per day [11] and kill more than nine rats per night.…”

The Use of Nest Boxes in Malaysia: Design and the Potential for Research and In-situ Conservation of Birds

“…The use of nest boxes has contributed to a wide range of research topics varying from breeding ecology (Arct et al, 2022;Beasley & Parrish, 2009;Davis et al, 2007;Hanmer et al, 2017;Mainwaring et al, 2015;Palko et al, 2011), feeding ecology (Balčiauskienė et al, 2005;Hudin et al, 2017;Rejt, 2001), nest site preference (Cooper & Bonter, 2008;Hanmer et al, 2017;Miller, 2002;Olah et al, 2014;Ortiz-Catedral & Brunton, 2009), conspecific and heterospecific interactions (Gong et al, 2018;Zárybnická et al, 2016), as well as occupancy rate (Liébana & Sarasola, 2013;Sudarmaji et al, 2021;Zhang et al, 2021). Additionally, some studies retrieved nestlings, breeding pairs, or even nest materials from nest boxes to assess the presence of ectoparasites (Hanmer et al, 2017;Proudfoot et al, 2006;Soltész et al, 2018) and the effect of rodenticide exposure (Richards et al, 2004;Geduhn et al, 2016), as well as for population genetic studies (Gelter & Tegelström, 1992;Riyahi et al, 2022).…”

“…For decades, studies using nest boxes were frequently done in the temperate region (Arct et al, 2022;Calabrese et al, 2020;Cooper & Bonter, 2008;Gelter & Tegelström, 1992;Gong et al, 2018;Hudin et al, 2017;Liébana & Sarasola, 2013;Ortiz-Catedral & Brunton, 2009;Raid, 2012;Rejt, 2001;Riyahi et al, 2022;Soltész et al, 2018;Zhang et al, 2021), with fewer studies conducted in the subtropic (Miller, 2002;Davis et al, 2007;Wimberger et al, 2017) and tropical regions (Cremades et al, 2011;Palko et al, 2011;Pasuwan et al, 2011;Olah et al, 2014;Sudarmaji et al, 2021). The implementation of nest boxes in the Southeast Asian region is still relatively new, apart from provisioning nest boxes for barn owls (Tyto alba javanica) to encourage the local population to breed and control the rodents in agricultural areas (Adidharma, 2002;Sipayung, 1992).…”

Implementation of the QCDMSE Strategy in the Community Empowerment Program to Utilize the Sulawesi Masked Owls as a Natural Predator for Rodents

“…Serak Sulawesi merupakan satwa endemik. Hewan ini adalah hewan yang hidup di malam hari (nocturnal), sama dengan tikus, mampu memangsa 6-8 ekor tikus/hari (Sudarmaji et al 2021;Murgianto et al 2022). Kehadiran Serak Sulawesi di lahan pertanian mengurangi kerusakan dan kerugian ekonomi dari serangan hewan pengerat/tikus.…”