Slate-colored Hawk
Buteogallus schistaceus
Chunky, broad-winged slate gray hawk with white tail bands and bright red facial skin, bill, and legs. Closely associated with water, and most frequently found in singles and pairs perched around oxbow lakes, forested streams, flooded forests, and floodplain forests.
Identification
It is a medium-sized to large bird, typically about 40 cm (16 in) long. It is medium slate-grey in color, with contrasting bright white horizontal banding on its tail feathers. It has a medium-white breast with vertical black markings. It has a large orange cere at the base of its beak, and large yellow eyes.
Taxonomy
- Scientific name
- Buteogallus schistaceus
- Authority
- (Sundevall, 1850)
- Order
- Accipitriformes
- Family
- Accipitridae
- Genus
- Buteogallus
Range and habitat
- Migration
- Resident species
Conservation
- Population trend
- declining
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
Other Birds
Pale-headed Woodpecker
Gecinulus grantia
A bamboo specialist, this is an odd-looking woodpecker with a dark body, sickly-looking pale head, and blood-red patches on the wings. Gives short rapid-fire bursts of drums which, due to the hollow stems of bamboo, often have an odd, reverberating quality. Pale bill is significantly shorter than that of the larger Bay Woodpecker, which seldom drums, if at all.
Bronze Parotia
Parotia berlepschi
A fairly large, short-tailed bird of mid-mountane forest canopy in the Foja Mountains. Male is mainly black with white flanks, bronzy-scaled chest and 6 antennalike feathers projecting from the back of the head. Note the blue eye. The female is dull brown above with rufous in the wing, strongly-barred underparts and pale bands above and below the eye. The male dances at a terrestrial display court. There are no other similar birds-of-paradise that co-occur. Vocalizations include loud rasps, rattles or a single or double-note squeak “wi-dik!”.
African Piculet
Verreauxia africana
A tiny woodpecker of forest and forest edge, more likely to be mistaken for a crombec than for another species of woodpecker. A squat bird with a round body, a large head, a short, stout bill, and a very short tail. Body is gray overall with greenish wings, white markings around the ears, and orange around the eyes. Males have an orange forehead. Voice is a weak trilling “si-si-si-si-si.”
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