Ninox

Ninox
Morepork Ninox (novaeseelandiae) novaeseelandiae
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Strigiformes
Family:	Strigidae
Genus:	Ninox Hodgson, 1837

Ninox is a genus of true owls comprising about 30 species found in Asia and Australasia. Many species are known as hawk owls or boobooks. Note that the northern hawk-owl Surnia ulula is not a member of this genus. Molecular analysis indicates the genus is an early offshoot from the ancestors of the rest of the true owls, and are maybe best-classified in a subfamily Ninoxinae with the genera Sceloglaux and Uroglaux. The genus was introduced by the English naturalist Brian Houghton Hodgson in 1837.

The species of Ninox are:

The fossil owls "Otus" wintershofensis and "Strix" brevis, both from the Early or Middle Miocene of Wintershof West, Germany, are close to this genus; the latter was sometimes explicitly placed in Ninox (Olson 1985) but is now in Intutula. "Strix" edwardsi from the Late Miocene of La Grive St. Alban, France, might also belong into this group.

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