Birds, Conservation

Sighting of Eurasian Hobby at Gumpe Hills, Kasaragod district

Prashantha Krishna M C

Eurasian Hobby at Gumpe Hills

Eurasian Hobby Falco subbuteo is a migratory falcon that breeds across Eurasia and winters in south and central Africa, southern and south eastern Asia including India and south China (Brazil 2009). The first photographic documentation of Eurasian Hobby from Kerala was by Abhilash Arjunan from Punchakkari, Thiruvananthapuram on 14 December  2015 (https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S26328154).  Here, I report the second sighting of the species at Gumpe hills, Kasaragod on 5 November 2016.

Gumpe (12.67° N, 75.00° E) is a small hillock located in Kasaragod district of Kerala, which is known for its raptor diversity in the wintering season (my personal observations since 2014). At 3.45 pm, I sighted a small raptor sitting on an isolated tree about 15 feet above the ground. I first thought it was an Amur Falcon Falco amurensis, the photos taken confirmed it to be a Eurasian Hobby.

The bird was a compact sized falcon with greyish black wings and pale brownish breast with thick long dark streaks on the breast, down the sides and up to the legs. It had a distinct facial pattern: black head with broad black roundish moustachial stripes which protruded on either side of the white neck and throat. The bird had a thin white eyebrow and blackish blue beak with yellow base. The legs were deep yellow in color, the tail was short with thin horizontal barring and wing tips extended beyond the tail tip. These diagnostic features confirmed the identification of this raptor as Eurasian Hobby (Brazil, 2009, Grimmett et al., 2011.). The absence of rufous thighs and under tail-coverts indicated it to be a sub adult individual (Grimmett et al., 2011, Franke-Bryson, 2016).

Hobbies are world travellers and are found in areas far beyond their breeding range but their distribution in the southern part of Indian subcontinent is scarce (Grimmett et al., 2011, eBird range map) There were sightings of this falcon from nearby Dakshina Kannada district of Karnataka and immediately after the sighting from Gumpe hills and there was one more sighting from Kole wetlands, Thrissur (eBird range map).

As per the IUCN red list of threatened species, this falcon is categorized as of least concern (LC).

 

References

  • BirdLife International. 2016. Falco subbuteo. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2016: e.T22696460A93564381. http://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2016-3.RLTS.T22696460A93564381.en. Downloaded on 17 September 2018
  • Brazil M 2009. Birds of East Asia: China, Taiwan, Korea, Japan and Russia. Princeton field guides. Princeton University press.
  • eBird range map of Eurasian Hobby, accessed on 17 September 2018: https://goo.gl/QNFH76
  • Franke- Bryson U 2016.Swifter than swifts: Second Eurasian Hobby ringed in Namibia.                               url: https://journals.uct.ac.za/index.php/BOJ/article/view/379/420
  • Grimmett, Richard ., Carol Inskipp, Tim Inskipp. Birds of the Indian subcontinent. 2011. Second edition. Oxford University press.    
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