A number of personal records for Cabranosa were broken today, the first of which was brought about by an influx of hawks. Multiple Sparrowhawks were seen migrating together and at one point we saw four Goshawks harassing each other and Sparrowhawks. Below, one of the juvenile Goshawks:- The second record and of some importance, related to seven Bonelli's Eagles observed over our watchpoint. Such observations help in assessing the numbers of this rare eagle in Portugal. We began in the morning with two juvenile Bonelli's. One was the pale bird I have previously shown, the other a familiar coloured individual, with the tan coloured breast and wing pattern :- In the afternoon, adult Bonelli's Eagles together with a juvenile and what appears to be a 2nd/3rd year eagle. This eagle is shown flying below the two grey coloured adults :- Let's have a look at this new Bonelli's Eagle and some of the plumage features:- I should have mentioned that today, all the raptors were flying incredibly high and these Bonelli's were only visible to keen eyes. For that reason, I can't zoom the images in any further, but would much rather have some record of these birds than none at all. So on this individual, much of the tan colour seen on the forewing and breast of a juvenile has faded considerably and, will tend towards the grey of an adult in time. The tail is showing a dark tip which the juvenile does not have and the trailing edge of the wing is showing traces of black, which will be a complete black edge when an adult. We know that there are satellite-tagged individuals showing up also giving us an encouraging number of these rare eagles to evaluate. Yesterday, we saw two different Eleonora's Falcons. The morning bird went through so quickly I could only watch it depart to the north. A later bird and sadly again, high up in the sky, a dark phase adult falcon was very unusual here. I think this first image shows the Eleonora's feeding on the wing, like a Hobby does, perhaps taking a dragonfly in its claws :- The Eleonora's appears to be moulting considerably. We are still seeing some Honey Buzzards passing over and showing some interesting colour forms. Perhaps you've noticed my profile picture has changed on my Facebook account. Tiago G made a reference to 'Where's Wally' and in case you are wondering, he's a little lower down the stem that I'm holding. While attempting to keep 'Ellie the dog' off the toxic Apple of Sodom bush(!) I am in fact looking at the caterpillar of the magnificent Death's Head Hawkmoth.
These caterpillars are really colourful and in size, can be the same as an index finger :- Comments are closed.
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