Is that a eagle? (pics)

[cyprusmax47]

Unfortunately there was so much dust in the sky yesterday when I was able to take this pic. Would like to know if it is an eagle...


It was first only one, but after a while a second one was in the air, while the other landed on a shrub, distance ca 1 km or more? (zoom 60x)!


here we are...


Max

[trevnhil]

It looks like an eagle to me. We have two or three in the valley next to us.

[Aargent]

I am no expert but it might be a European Honey Buzzard, a type of Kite. There doesn't seem to be enough white at the front to be an Eagle at least not a Bonelli's.

[Ramone]

I'd put my money on a buzzard. But I've been wrong before.

[JimX]

It looks like a local Cyprus Buzard.

Welcome to the hotel Califonia.

They do have Eagles here so they say.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_birds_of_Cyprus

[ApusApus]

It's a Long-legged Buzzard Buteo rufinus, you can make out the pale area on the outer edge of the wing in the 1st photo which also shows this bird's typical eagle-like soaring on lifted wings!


Shane

[cyprusmax47]

Thank you, Shane. In German language they call it Adlerbussard (Eagle buzzard)

Max

[PaphosAL]

Beautiful bird. Long may it survive from the Rambo hunters...

AL

[kingfisher]

Thank you for the picture Max.
I would agree that it is a long legged buzzard. A few years ago when walking with my dog he alerted me to what turned out to be a very recently dead long legged buzzard beneath the high voltage lines running from the Agios Neophytos Monastery to the transmitter masts on Mellisovounos.
It had rained the previous night, and I surmised the unfortunate raptor had electrocuted itself; this was bourne out when I got the corpse home and measured the outstretched wingspan at almost six feet. It weighed in at exactly two pounds three ounces. I was anxious to freeze it, as it was a perfect specimen to be passed on to a taxidermist, but my wife vetoed that plan!
I wrote to Martin Hellicar at Birdlife Cyprus, and enclosed pictures and details for their records, as there were then I believe about six pairs breeding on the island; I used to see them more often than I do now. The Cypriots call them “the Rabbit Hawk”. Possibly the scarcity of rabbits due to over enthusiastic hunting has affected their numbers...

[PaphosAL]

There might be a scarcity of rabbits in the hills, Kingfisher, but there are still plenty of hares on the fields adjacent to banana plantations on the coastal areas.

But these probably offer a more difficult choice / catch for predator v. prey?

AL

[ApusApus]

Wrong habitat AL, the larger BoP's generally don't like being close to humans!


Shane

[kingfisher]

Correction to my earlier post, prompted by Paphos Al's post- there are no wild rabbits in Cyprus, only the Cyprus Hare, [Lepus Cyprius].
Oddly, though, the hunters and butchers seem to refer to them as "rabbits",{and consequently their predator is called the "Rabbit Hawk"}.