Paphos Life

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

Max

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

AL

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...

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

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


Shane

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"}.