[9][7] The underside has a pale creamy gray-brown base color (ranging into dirty white in the palest individuals) overlaid about the throat and upper chest with horizontal, slightly crescent-shaped barring (hence its common name), while the belly is boldly streaked in a vertical pattern.

They quickly become juveniles which resemble adults but have less distinct markings (especially about the head and neck), more buff coloring overall, often some remnant down, pinkish skin and a pale, blue-green cere.

[67] Increases in forest distribution along the Missouri River and its tributaries provided barred owls with sufficient foraging habitat, protection from the weather, and concealment from avian predators.

[82][83] They are often found in bottomland hardwood forests in the largest swath of the native breeding range, often (particularly from Virginia south and west) with deep, dark stands of oak, gum and cypress.

[89] In Michigan, barred owl habitat usually consists largely of some combination of hemlock and maple trees, with mixed forest usage being use disproportionately to its prevalence in the environment.

[85][96] Furthermore, a study in North Carolina showed most barred owls appear to favor areas with at least 86 to 370 ha (210 to 910 acres) of woods but did not seem to be affected by the presence of roadways.

More so confined to inland areas, as in eastern Washington, Idaho, Manitoba and Montana, they prefer Douglas fir, ponderosa pine, paper birch, burr oak and western larch.

[9] Of 158 banded recoveries in the northern part of the range, movements during winter were found to cover no further than 10 km (6.2 mi), while all those recovered in Saskatchewan and Alberta scarcely moved at all.

[7][100][127][134][135] A compilation study that included a total of 7077 prey items using all methodologies, 71.9% were mammals, 9.5% were birds, 0.6% reptiles, 6% amphibians, 1.89% fish, 1% earthworms, 0.2% gastropods, 6.5% insects and 2.4% crayfish.

[139] The diet of barred owls in a much smaller study near Urbana, Illinois during winter was less homogeneous but still led by rodents, especially the meadow vole (32.3%) and white-footed mouse (23.5%).

[141] An unusual lack of diversity in barred owl pellets was found in several years of possibly an aseasonal study in Ann Arbor, Michigan where of 777 prey items, 83.3% were meadow voles.

[142] At Edwin S. George Preserve near the University of Michigan, the summer diet was also heavily rodent based, as among 146 prey items 37.9% were white-footed mice, 22.6% were southern bog lemming and 6.84% were meadow voles.

[137] Beyond the typical more meadow-dwelling voles and woodland edge-dwelling native mice, larger and more forest dwelling rodents of different varieties can be of variable import.

[154] Barred owls are also known predators of small mammalian carnivorans, mainly mustelids such as stoats (Mustela erminea) and long-tailed weasels (Neogale frenata).

[137][156][157][158] Much larger mammals are sometimes recorded in the foods of barred owls, but there are few details known about the age, condition, or circumstances (i.e. they may have been consumed as carrion or, perhaps more likely, young or infirm specimens were taken).

[42][116][123] Conspicuous nesting sites of barn swallow and purple martin on manmade structures and objects were revealed via video-monitoring to suffer heavy predation by barred owls.

These studies indicated that the barred owl may snatch passerines of any age, but recent fledglings are taken preferentially due to their more conspicuous behavior and limited ability to fly away.

[100][165][166][167] Forest birds seem to recognize the barred owl as a threat, with mobbing behavior evoked easily by playing recordings of their calls in the daytime.

[116] Predation by this species was reported upon a very young river cooter, which had a carapace width of only 31.4 mm (1.24 in), as well as on juvenile gopher tortoise and apparently diamondback terrapin.

[42][170] Of 123 prey items found in southern Manitoba, flying Sphinx moths and flightless scarab beetles each comprised 7% (most of the remaining balance being unidentified mammals and birds).

[7][188] In multiple parts of the range, including southwestern Ohio, North Carolina and northern Michigan, the paralleling habitat usage and nesting behavior of the barred owl and red-shouldered hawk has been noted.

[9][200] There are some very rare, singular cases of predation on barred owls (age unknown) by red-tailed hawks, which nonetheless generally appears to be a less menacing co-inhabitant than the goshawk.

[9] A particular cause of concern in intraguild predations[definition needed] by the barred has been their encroachment into the areas inhabited by western screech owl (Megascops kennicotti).

[26][42][60][151] Typically, nest sites are in rather deep and dark wooded areas, often with a well-developed understory but somewhat sparse lower branches, and may be fairly close to water.

[26] The most widely reported nesting trees in breeding cards were elms (21%) and beeches (15%), followed by oaks, hickories, yellow birches, sycamores, aspens, maples and poplars.

[7] The white down feathers that the barred owls are hatched with is replaced by white-tipped barred-buff second down at two to three weeks of age, correspondingly with growth of the wing primaries.

[7][227] Adult-like feathers begin to appear at six weeks of age, starting at the scapulars, then radiating down across the abdomen and flanks up through the upper breast, with the last wisps of down remaining for up to 4 months.

Little is known about the specific factors that dictate breeding success, but are likely to include the quality of the nesting site, the food supply in the area, the levels of disturbance from outside actors (usually humans) and the maturity of the pair.

Fish and Wildlife Service issued a draft of a management plan indicating that hunters in the Pacific Northwest would be encouraged to shoot more than a half million barred owls.

[269][284][285] John James Audubon illustrated the barred owl in Birds of America (published in London, 1827–1838) as Plate 46, where it is shown threatening a grey squirrel.