Grey-bellied hawk facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Grey-bellied hawk |
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| Conservation status | |
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Accipiter
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| Species: |
poliogaster
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| Location where the grey-bellied hawk can be found (South America only) | |
The grey-bellied hawk or grey-bellied goshawk (Accipiter poliogaster) is a large and rare bird of prey found in the forests of South America. It belongs to the Accipitridae family, which includes hawks, eagles, and kites.
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Discovering the Grey-bellied Hawk
The grey-bellied hawk was first described in 1824 by a Dutch scientist named Coenraad Jacob Temminck. He was a naturalist who studied animals.
What Does the Grey-bellied Hawk Look Like?
This hawk is a medium-sized bird. It measures about 38 to 51 centimeters (15 to 20 inches) long. Female hawks are much bigger than males, sometimes by as much as 40%!
The hawk's feathers are mostly black or dark grey on its back and wings. Its throat and belly are white or light grey. As its name suggests, its belly is a pale grey color.
Head and Tail Features
The hawk's head is black or very dark grey. This dark color goes halfway down its throat before suddenly turning white. This makes it look like it's wearing a "hood" or "cap." Male hawks have a darker top of the head, while females have a more even dark color all over their head and back.
You might see white feathers on the back of its neck, looking like white spots. Its tail is black or grey with three wide, light grey stripes. The tip of the tail is a narrow white band. The hawk has short wings, legs, and tail for its body size. It also has a strong, heavy beak and head.
Eye and Beak Colors
The hawk's feet, legs, and the skin around its eyes are yellow. Its beak is black with a bluish-grey base. The color of its eyes (iris) can be yellow or red. Females often have darker grey cheeks than males.
Young Hawks
Young grey-bellied hawks look a bit different. Their feathers are said to look like those of the ornate hawk eagle. Because of this, young grey-bellied hawks were once thought to be a separate species!
Spotting Them in Nature
It can be tricky to tell the grey-bellied hawk apart from other birds. It looks similar in size and shape to the collared forest falcon and slaty-backed forest falcon. However, these other falcons have very different colors.
You might see this hawk flying high above forests. It makes a cackling sound that goes "kek-kek-kek-kek-kek-kek" and then fades away. These hawks usually live for about 7.2 years.
Where Do Grey-bellied Hawks Live?
These hawks live in tropical lowland evergreen forests in South America. They are found at heights of about 250 to 500 meters (820 to 1,640 feet) above sea level.
Their Home Range
They live in many countries, but their presence is scattered. You can find them in parts of northern and eastern Colombia, southern Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname, eastern Ecuador, central and eastern Peru, the Amazon rainforest in Brazil, northern Bolivia, eastern Paraguay, and northeast Argentina.
In Ecuador, they are only seen in untouched forest areas. In French Guiana, they have been seen in both old forests and recently logged areas. Sometimes, they are even seen by accident in Costa Rica. This might mean they are slowly moving into new areas as humans change the land. They seem to be okay with nesting in places that have been disturbed by people.
Besides rainforests, they also live in areas with trees along rivers, other thick woodlands, and sometimes in forests that are regrowing. Even though they live across a huge area (about 7,490,000 square kilometres (2,890,000 sq mi)), they are generally rare and only found in specific spots.
Do They Migrate?
Most grey-bellied hawks stay in the same area all year. However, some have been reported to migrate. This means they move from the south towards the equator during the winter, usually from March to June. In Ecuador, they are seen all year, so they are considered permanent residents there.
Grey-bellied Hawk Life and Habits
How Grey-bellied Hawks Find Food
We don't know much about how these hawks hunt. Since they are medium-sized, scientists think they probably catch fairly large prey. They might mostly eat small songbirds and tinamous, which are ground-dwelling birds.
Once, a young armadillo was found as food brought to a nest for the baby hawks. They might also eat lizards that live in trees, tree frogs, and large water-loving insects.
The grey-bellied hawk is thought to be a "still hunter." This means it probably sits quietly on a branch in the forest canopy. It waits patiently for prey to pass by instead of flying around to hunt.
Grey-bellied Hawk Reproduction and Life Cycle
Scientists have only seen and described the breeding of this shy hawk species once in the wild. This happened in southern Brazil. They seem to build nests like other Accipiter species found in the Neotropical region (Central and South America).
However, grey-bellied hawk chicks stay in the nest longer than other hawk chicks, for about 49 days. The single nest observed was a platform built high up in the branches of a Parana pine tree. This tree might be a favorite nesting spot because its thick branches can hide the nest from other birds of prey that might try to attack it.
The nest had two eggs, but only one chick survived. This chick left the nest after 49 days. In a hawk pair, the male hunts for food. He brings it back for the female to feed to the young, just like many other Accipiter species. But unlike some other Accipiter species, the female grey-bellied hawk does not bring food to the nestlings herself while they are growing.
Challenges for Grey-bellied Hawks
The main threat to the grey-bellied hawk's forest home is deforestation in the Amazon Basin. This means forests are being cut down. Because these hawks are found in scattered areas, losing parts of their habitat can split their populations into smaller, isolated groups. This is called population fragmentation.
However, these hawks seem to be somewhat able to handle changes to their habitat. They have been seen hunting and nesting in areas that have been disturbed by humans. Still, their numbers are expected to go down. This is because they can be hunted and trapped, and habitat changes might affect them more negatively over time. Their rarity might also be partly due to competition with other forest falcons.
Conservation Status
The IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) lists the grey-bellied hawk as Near Threatened. This means it is close to becoming threatened with extinction. It was moved from "Least Concern" in 2012. This change happened because scientists expect its population to decline in the future due to ongoing deforestation in the Amazon. The total number of grey-bellied hawks is estimated to be between 1,000 and 10,000 individuals.
