Premium
Food, predation and breeding season in Sparrowhawks (Accipiter nisus)
Author(s) -
Newton Newton,
Marquiss M.
Publication year - 1982
Publication title -
journal of zoology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.915
H-Index - 96
eISSN - 1469-7998
pISSN - 0952-8369
DOI - 10.1111/jzo.1982.197.2.221
Subject(s) - accipiter , predation , biology , nest (protein structural motif) , seasonal breeder , population , accipitridae , ecology , zoology , period (music) , demography , physics , acoustics , biochemistry , sociology
During a ten‐year study, Sparrowhawks Accipiter nisus in south Scotland fed almost entirely on other birds; the smaller male hawk concentrated on smaller prey‐species than the larger female took. Throughout the spring and summer the hawks took large numbers of fledgling birds. Each prey species increased in the hawk diet for a short period after its young had left the nest; and as different prey species produced their young at different dates, the hawks continually switched emphasis from one prey species to another through the season. Breeding by Sparrowhawks coincided almost exactly with the period that fledgling song birds were available each year. The first hawks to lay started within five to ten days after fledglings first became available in spring, and the nestling period of the hawk population, when food demands were greatest, coincided with the period of peak fledgling supply.