1. a privilege conferred on an individual, group, or company by a government: a franchise to operate a bus system. 2. a. the right or license granted by a company to an individual or group to market its products or services in a specific territory.
Since owls are birds of prey they need to hunt and kill other animals to survive. Their diet mainly includes fish, reptiles, amphibians, birds, small animals and insects. The type of food really depends on the species of owl. For example, the Asian Fish Owl and the African Fishing Owl are highly specialized at catch fish while the barn owl is specialized in catching mice.
These birds wait on a high perch at night and swoop down on prey. They mainly eat small organisms with a focus on small mammals in their diet. A test done by Swengel and Swengel found that the northern saw-whet owls most often eat deer mice, 67% and voles, 16% of the time in Wisconsin. A similar test done by Holt and Leroux in Montana found that these owls ate more voles than other mammal species.