Monday, January 16, 2012

Barbary Falcon

This morning I joined Mimi Ron who was doing a plant survey at Neot Hakikar. Mimi is the botanic equivalent of Hadoram in Israel - the lady just knows her plants! Anyway, while driving around I bumped into this cracking adult male Barbary Falcon. These guys breed in the mountains above the valley, and come down to hunt over the valley. This male must be very old - it is one of the least-streaked individuals I have ever seen, it has this lovely pinkish wash on the underparts. Interestingly, it has a completely dark crown, with some rufous only on the rear ear coverts. Note the dark wingtips, and distinct barring on the tail, getting bolder towards the tip.
Sorry for the record shots, it was very distant.

Barbary Falcon - adult male




2 comments:

  1. Yoav - I am intrigued, i have only a couple of sightings of Barbary Falcon from Morocco - where it is a description species. There are a couple of regular, known, sites which is where i saw them. You say 'old' does the breast streaking diminish with age or do you know when this bird bred or is there a method for ageing?

    ATB

    Laurie -

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  2. Hi, from what I've learned from Forsman, maturer birds have less treaking on the underparts. Similar to several other falcons. Yoav.

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