A TEAM of Oxford academics think they have proven a ‘Harry Potter effect’ which has seen owl ownership soar in Indonesia.

By comparing data from the market between 1979 to 2016, factoring the period before and after the release of the Harry Potter novels twenty years ago, the researchers were able to show that there has been an increase in the owl trade.

They also highlighted that where owls used to be called Burung hantu, which translates as ghost birds, now they are referred to as Burung Harry Potter – meaning Harry Potter birds.

Professor Vincent Nijman at Oxford Brookes University said: “In the 1990s, when surveying the bird markets I would typically see one or two owls for sale amongst the thousands of wild-caught birds on offer but equally often not a single owl was on display.

“Now, returning to those same markets we can see dozens of owls for sale of a wide range of species and owls are always present, all taken from the wild.

“What we have seen in Indonesia is a massive increase in popularity of owls in general and pet owl lovers organise themselves on social media to exchange information on how to keep owls, what owls are available as pets, and where to obtain them.”

Author JK Rowling had spoken out about keeping owls as pets and said: “If anybody has been influenced by my books to think an owl would be happiest shut in a small cage and kept in a house, I would like to say as forcefully as I can, you are wrong.”

The paper, ‘The Harry Potter effect’ is published in the open access journal Global Ecology and Conservation.