Animalia Life
Pandion haliaetus
SUBFAMILY
Pandioninae
TAXONOMY
Falco haliaetus Linnaeus, 1758, Sweden. Four subspecies.
OTHER COMMON NAMES
English: Fish hawk; French: Balbuzard pкcheur; German:
Fischadler; Spanish: Aguila Pescadora.
PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS
21.7–22.8 in (55–58 cm); male 2.6–3.5 lb (1.2–1.6 kg), female
3.5–4.4 lb (1.6–2 kg). Brown upperparts with white legs and
chest, accented with speckled necklace.
DISTRIBUTION
P.h. haliaetus: Scandinavia to Japan, the Mediterranean, Red
Sea, and Cape Verde Islands; wintering in South Africa, India,
Indonesia, and the Philippines. P.h. carolensis: Labrador to
Alaska to Florida and Arizona, wintering in Peru and South
Brazil. P.h. ridgwayi: Caribbean. P.h. cristatus: Australia to New
Caledonia to New Guinea, Java, and Sulawesi.
HABITAT
Low altitude inland and shallow marine waters, including
marshes, lakes, reservoirs, bays, sea coasts and islands, estuaries,
and, less often, rivers. Almost exclusively coastal and subcoastal
in Australasia and much of Asia.
BEHAVIOR
Solitary, pairs, or family groups, occasionally larger groups;
northern populations, where winter sends fish to deeper water,
are migratory, southern populations are sedentary.
FEEDING ECOLOGY AND DIET
Feeds almost exclusively on live fish, rarely turtles and seabirds,
and fish found dead or dying.
REPRODUCTIVE BIOLOGY
Breeds in solitary pairs (e.g., Australia and Britain) or loose
colonies (e.g., Mediterranean and United States), sometimes of
hundreds of birds; usually monogamous but polygynous trios
found; large stick nest lined with flotsam, seaweed, dead grass
or leaves, near water, on islet, sea-cliff, mangrove or other tree,
man-made structure, or on ground on predator-free island. Annual
breeding season, usually starting winter-spring (into summer
in the north). Usual clutch is three eggs; incubation about
five weeks; fledge at about seven weeks; fledglings remain with
adults two to eight weeks until migration in northern populations,
longer in resident populations.
CONSERVATION STATUS
Not threatened. Generally common and locally abundant
throughout much of range.
SIGNIFICANCE TO HUMANS
Occasionally regarded as a competitor for fish and can be a
nuisance at inland fisheries/hatcheries and when nesting on
powerpoles (shorting-out electricity).
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