Hawk bird. Hawk lifestyle and habitat

The hawk, translated from Latin as the Accipiter genus, subfamily Accipitrinae, is a bird of prey from the hawk family, order Falconiformes, type: chordates, class: birds. Short, wide, rounded wings allow the hawk to develop great speed, and long claws and powerful paws make it easy to kill any prey. White feathers above the eyes of the hawk create the illusion of wide "eyebrows" and give it a slightly fabulous look, and the swiftness, agility and maneuverability of these birds is reflected in numerous proverbs and sayings.

Watching the flight of hawks, incredibly beautiful and strong birds, is a pleasure.

Photo. A hawk in the sky - soars in flight.

The hawk lives almost everywhere, but prefers a warm climate to a cold one and well-lit forests and shrublands to open areas. Prey can be seen from a distance of more than one and a half kilometers and does not see any obstacles on the way, so it can injure itself by crashing into a pole or other obstacle.

Photo. Hawk on the hunt.

Photo. The hawk has already coped with prey.

The color of plumage in birds of this family is diverse: from blue-gray undertones and shades to classic deep black. The dorsal part is always darker than the ventral part, and the outfit of young and adult males is completely different from each other. Hawks live mainly in pairs; females, along with males, actively defend their territory from strangers.

The male and female communicate with each other with certain sounds, this is especially noticeable when the birds build nests.

Photo. The hawk in the nest takes care of the offspring.

The caution of these birds helps them live to old age and die at a fairly old age.

In Russia, the sparrowhawk and goshawk are the most common. The regal posture distinguishes these birds from their relatives. The hawk among some peoples is considered the messenger of God and a noble, mystical bird.

Photo. Bird of prey hawk.

We suggest watching a fragment of the film - a hawk hunts a partridge.

Small, swift and very maneuverable, the sparrow hawk, or small hawk, is highly valued by hunters, because a well-trained bird, according to Abkhaz hunters, is capable of getting up to a hundred quails or partridges a day! From the point of view of ornithology, the small hawk is of interest as a typical representative of the hawk-like order with all the habits inherent in a real predator.

Sparrow hawk in the sky.

And for a photographer, this bird is a real challenge, because it is extremely difficult to take it by surprise, and high-quality photos of a sparrow hawk can become an adornment of any collection.

What does a sparrow hawk look like

The sparrow hawk, also known as the small hawk, belongs to the genus of true hawks. However, do not confuse it with other sparrowhawks, such as small, spotted-tailed, African small or wine-breasted. Despite the common word "sparrow hawk", these birds are outwardly completely different.

In appearance, the sparrowhawk is similar to its relative - the goshawk, but 1.5 times smaller than it. Like many hawks, female sparrowhawks are a quarter larger and heavier than males. The growth of an adult female is 35-41 cm, body weight reaches 186-345 g. Males are the size of a dove, grow up to 29-34 cm in length and weigh about 100-200 g. Larger and stronger females are used as birds of prey.

Sparrowhawks are light graceful birds with a neat rounded head, slender legs, thin tarsals and long fingers. Their wings are short and wide, and the tail, on the contrary, is long, but not rounded, but as if evenly cut off.

The backs of males are painted slate-gray, females are grayish-brown above. The lower part of the bird's body is dotted with rusty-brown transverse streaks forming ripples: large in females, smaller in males.

Wings of sparrowhawks are solid dark gray above, transversely striped below. The undertail is white, the top of the tail is gray with clearly visible four transverse bands. The legs and toes of the birds are yellow, with sharp black claws.

The eyes of predators are yellow, in males they are orange. The beak is bluish, the cere is bright yellow. Above the eye of the sparrow hawk, a white eyebrow is clearly visible, much narrower than that of the goshawk, so the look of the small hawk is not so piercing and stern.

Juveniles are distinguished by their brownish dorsal plumage, very large undulations on the lower body, and pale yellow irises.

Within the range of the sparrowhawk, another relative similar to it lives - the European tuvik, also known as the short-legged hawk. However, he does not have white eyebrows and, as the name suggests, shorter legs.

Portrait of a sparrowhawk.

Sparrowhawk in flight.

Sparrowhawk on a branch with the remains of prey.

Portrait of a sparrowhawk.

Where does the sparrowhawk live

The Lesser Hawk is one of the most common predators of the Old World, widely distributed in the temperate and subtropical zones of Eurasia. From north to south, the range of the sparrowhawk extends from the tundra to the Mediterranean Sea, the extreme western point is the Canary Islands, in the east the birds live all the way to Kamchatka.

Birds from the northern regions winter in Asia and North Africa, the rest of the population lead a sedentary lifestyle. Depending on the habitat, scientists have described 6 subspecies of the sparrow hawk. The smallest lives in the northwest of the African continent.

The favorite biotopes of the sparrowhawk are forests, but not dense thickets, but forest edges, forest-steppes and river floodplains. In open areas - in the steppes and semi-deserts, the predator is found on migrations, it rises to mountains up to 5 thousand meters above sea level.

The small hawk can be found near agricultural land, on the outskirts of settlements, nests of predators are sometimes found in city parks.

The main condition for habitat and nesting is a good food base.

Sparrowhawk bathes.

Sparrowhawk bathes.

Sparrowhawk in flight.

Sparrowhawk in flight.

Portrait of a sparrowhawk.

What does the Sparrowhawk eat?

The favorite food of the small hawk is small and medium-sized birds. The modest size does not allow the sparrowhawk to hunt large game, however, observers say that a brave predator can even attack a pheasant that is 2 times its size!

The diet is based on numerous passerines, including ravens, as well as shorebirds, plovers, hazel grouses, partridges, pigeons and other bird species.

A sparrow hawk attacked a dove.

Sparrowhawk on snow with prey.

Sparrowhawk after dinner.

The sparrowhawk hunts from an ambush or looks out for prey from a height. The flight of the predator is light and smooth, it can hover for quite a long time, alternating between flapping wings and soft gliding. The Sparrowhawk looks very beautiful in the photo with its tail open like a fan.

The search flight of a small hawk passes low above the ground and, having noticed a potential prey, the predator shows the miracles of maneuverability inherent in hawks. Rapid flight along a flexible trajectory is provided by short bent wings and a long tail.

Deftly bending around obstacles, the sparrowhawk overtakes prey, plunging sharp long claws into the bird's body. The predator plucks the caught game and eats it from the head. The male prey confines itself to the head of the bird, and takes the rest to the nest.

If sparrowhawks fed exclusively on their own kind, they would have long been classified as pests and systematically exterminated. The little hawk does indeed destroy many useful birds, but at the same time it kills the weak and the sick.

In early spring, when rodents appear in abundance from flood-flooded burrows, the sparrowhawk performs the honorary mission of field orderly, willingly eating voles. In the south of the range, predators do not refuse to eat large insect pests, therefore, in general, they do not cause serious damage to bird populations.

An agile and indefatigable hunter, the sparrowhawk is usually silent, and only during the mating season can you hear its quick cries of “kyu-kyu” and “kick-kick-kick”.

Reproduction features

The lesser hawk is a monogamous bird. Pairs appear on nesting sites only in April, and new nests are built every year. The nesting of a pair of sparrowhawks is easy to identify by several nests located close to tree trunks and bird bones scattered on the ground.

Unlike the goshawk, small hawks never use fresh shoots for construction, but build a nest from dry twigs of coniferous trees and withered grass.

The nest, 38-40 cm in diameter and height, looks like a randomly thrown bunch of branches. The female lines the tray with needles, mosses, animal hair, and can pluck feathers from her stomach.

In May - early June, the female lays from 4 to 6 white matte eggs with brownish-rusty spots and speckles. Incubates very tightly, for 32 days, feeds on food brought by the male.

In a deep nest, the female sparrowhawk is almost invisible. You can determine which nest is inhabited by knocking on the trunk, the disturbed female is immediately removed, but quickly returns.

Chicks are born covered with white down with a beige tint. At first, the male continues to feed the female and brood. Sometimes he brings an already plucked bird, or the female does it, and then feeds the chicks, tearing off a piece from the prey.

When the chicks get stronger, the female also begins to hunt, and after 1-1.5 months, young sparrowhawks already know how to fly.

Sparrowhawk nest with chicks.

Sparrowhawk nest with grown chicks.

Experienced hunters of the peoples of the East often take the chicks out of the nest, while they have not yet acquired the ability to fly. The males are then released and the females are tamed, trained and kept as birds of prey. Others lure adult sparrowhawks into traps, predators are also successfully trained and used in hunting partridges, quails and waders.

In the middle of the last century, due to the widespread use of pesticides, the survival of the little hawk was threatened. For more than 50 years, the number of the species has recovered and today the bird population is not threatened. Under favorable conditions, sparrowhawks live for at least 12 years.

Have you ever observed how a flock of crows or jackdaws with noise and din drives one bird, not exceeding in size themselves. This bird, fleeing from pursuers, is none other than the sparrowhawk, a predator from the hawk family. During periods of autumn migrations, hawks become numerous even in cities. It is easy to recognize the sparrowhawk by its slender silhouette, long tail extended backwards and short, wide wings.

The hawk is not embarrassed by the commotion in the bird flock, it flies away slowly, often changing direction suddenly, turning over in the air, grabs one of the pursuers, which adds panic and noise. The diet of the sparrow hawk is made up of small birds. Smaller males catch sparrow-sized birds (goldfinches, tits, buntings, warblers, wrens, kinglets, etc.), large females take larger prey (pigeons, starlings, thrushes, jackdaws, woodpeckers, etc.).

A THUNDER OF SPARROWS AND TITTS

The sparrowhawk hunts, hiding in thickets of bushes or on tree branches. He waits for the appearance of the victim and rushes at her with lightning speed. Often a predator flies low above the ground, deftly maneuvering between bushes and trees, and pursues the prey until it catches it. He can grab prey in flight, or he can catch it calmly sitting on a branch. The sparrowhawk flies up quickly and silently, so that the victim does not even have time to understand anything. He even steals tits from feeders and sparrows near the bus stop, not at all embarrassed by the presence of people nearby.

It is common for hawks to pluck prey before killing it, but if someone frightens it, then it can leave the unfortunate bird. According to the remnants of the meal, it can be determined that a sparrow hawk visited here. He plucks his prey, as a rule, on a small elevation, perch (stump or log), and very rarely on the ground or snow, leaving a bunch of feathers, paws, bones, beak and front part of the bird's skull at the feast site. After a meal, the hawk regurgitates compressed undigested parts of the prey (bones, feathers, wool) - scientists call them a pellet. The average size of a sparrowhawk pellet is 3.6 x 1.8 cm. The small hawk, as this species is also called, eats 80-120 g per day - this is about 2-4 birds the size of a sparrow. In winter, he needs a little more food.

Hunting for various birds and animals, hawks sometimes become the prey of a larger predator themselves. A marten can catch a sleeping bird at night, and a goshawk can catch it during the day.

RAPID AND SILENT

Sparrowhawk is a cautious and silent bird. It glides over trees, bushes, or low above the ground along buildings, looking for prey. Occasionally you can hear his abrupt cry "kick-kick-kick". During the mating season, he screams more often. The hawk has a truly eagle gaze: its eyes are large, about 1% of body weight, directed forward, which provides a large field of binocular vision. Visual acuity exceeds human about eight times.

The sparrowhawk settles on forest edges, in groves and copses. In the mountains, it climbs to a height of up to 2000 m, but within the forest zone. In winter, it can be seen in city parks and squares. The hawk is distributed in Europe from to, in Western Siberia to the Yenisei basin, in winter it is found in Central Asia, North Africa. In winter, sparrowhawks become especially numerous in the Crimea and the Caucasus. In the south, these birds nest everywhere, except for treeless areas. For example, they are not in the steppe part of Turkestan and. The northern border of the range passes in Lapland (at about 69 ° north latitude), near Arkhangelsk along the Pechora, then approximately at the Arctic Circle.

SOCKETS TO CHOOSE

Birds are ready to breed already at the age of one or even a little earlier. Sparrowhawk nesting sites are permanent and have been used for many years in a row. A pair may have several nests, which it uses alternately in different years. The hawk's nest is a small (about 35-40 cm in diameter), loose and careless building made of branches. The tray is quite deep, since the edges of the nest are raised, the lining is made of thinner veto-checks and needles. The nest is most often located in a fork of a spruce or pine, less often a birch or aspen, at a height of 2 to 8 m. The pair builds it together. Quite often, the sparrowhawk occupies the old pigeon nests. Birds lay their eggs quite late, in late April - early May. The clutch consists of 3-6, rarely 2-7, dull white, with dark brown spots and specks of eggs 40 x 32 mm in size. If for some reason the first clutch dies, then the birds lay their eggs again. Only the female incubates them; she sits tightly in the nest for 32-35 days.

DIFFICULTIES OF TENDER AGE

Incubation begins with the first egg, so the chicks are of different ages. They appear in late June - early July. Until the age of ten days, the chicks depend on external heating, and the mother stays with them all the time. At this time, she cannot hunt, and the male brings food to the nest. He gives her prey, and she is already feeding the chicks. In the event of the death of the female, her partner continues to bring food to the nest, but he is not adapted to feed the chicks, but simply throws the dead birds to them. If the chicks have not yet learned how to tear the prey, then they die of hunger surrounded by food. After the chicks establish their own thermoregulation, the female also begins to fly out to hunt. Chicks eat a lot - they need energy for growth and development. During this period, sparrowhawks catch much more prey than in non-breeding ones - from 10 to 15 birds, depending on the number of chicks in the brood. Moreover, at this time, the sparrowhawk does not hunt near the nest, but flies away for 4-5 km.

BEFORE MIGRATION

A month later, the grown chicks, with still inferior flight and tail feathers of the wings, crawl out of the nest and sit down near it. They learn to fly only at the age of five weeks. The development of females is faster than males. After another two weeks, the chicks fly away from the nest and begin to hunt on their own. Adult birds molt after the end of nesting: they start with wing feathers and end with the covering plumage of the body. This process takes 2.5 months for females, and 3 months for males. In September-October, birds from the northern regions begin migrating south. The average speed of hawks during flights is 40 km / h. In the middle lane, sparrowhawks often winter in cities.

Sparrowhawks have a so-called self-regulation of the population size, a phenomenon that is also characteristic of other birds of prey. In unfavorable years, when there is little food, the couple feeds no more than two chicks. Younger chicks simply do not get food, and they die in the first days of life.

Sparrowhawks are quite difficult to tame, and they are practically not used in falconry. Writer A. Green once tamed a hawk chick and named it Gul-Gul. The bird was never able to get its own food and died, released into the wild. Green captured the image of his feathered friend in the unfinished novel "Touchless" and the story "The Story of a Hawk".

a brief description of

Class: birds.
Order: falconiformes, or diurnal birds of prey.
Family: hawks.
Genus: true hawks.
Species: Sparrowhawk, or Lesser Hawk.
Latin name: Accipiter nisus .
Size: body length - 35-40 cm, wingspan - 64 cm.
Weight: 100-340 g
. Coloring: dark gray, sometimes with a bluish tint, the lower part of the body is light, with narrow chestnut or red small stripes.
Sparrowhawk Lifespan: 5-8 years.

Kira Stoletova

The Sparrowhawk is a bird of prey from the hawk family, distributed throughout almost the entire territory of the Eurasian continent.

Geographic distribution

A few decades ago, the population of sparrowhawks was declining due to the active introduction of agricultural pesticides into human activities and the hunting of these birds. However, today, with the widespread ban on the use of pesticides and the exclusion of sparrowhawks from the number of birds harmful to humans and farming, with the cessation of hunting for the sparrowhawk, their numbers are gradually increasing today.

The habitat of the sparrow hawk is the forests of temperate and subtropical zones, and not deep places, but open zones. They prefer coniferous and deciduous forests, can settle in the mountains at an altitude of up to 2.5 km above sea level.

During migration from the cold European climate, sparrowhawks move to the southeast direction of Asia or to the northern part of Africa. In Russia, sparrowhawks can be seen in the Ural River valley.

In total, the sparrowhawk family has 6 subspecies, each of which lives in different regions.

1. Partially, birds of the first species (nisus) are distributed in European territory right from the Asian west to the Siberian regions and in the region of Iran. These northern representatives migrate for wintering to the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, in a northeasterly direction to Africa, as well as towards Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.
2. The second subspecies (nisosimilis) is observed starting from the Siberian central and eastern regions up to Kamchatka and covering Japanese territory. It spreads from south to north across China Square. The migration of these sparrowhawks is eastward to Asia, Korea and Japan. Some individuals fly to African countries.
3. The third subspecies (melaschistos) is fixed in the mountainous region of Afghanistan and the Himalayas, in the south of Tibet and in the west of China.
4. The fourth subspecies (wolterstorffi) is distributed in Corsica and is found in areas of Sardinia.
5. Representatives of the fifth subspecies (granti) are observed in the Canary Islands and towards the island of Madeira.
6. The sixth species (punicus) has chosen the African northwest and the northern part of the Sahara as its habitat.

Typical features

The lesser hawk is a two times smaller copy of the usual large hawk representative, and its description is similar to it both in plumage color and in behavior. Small predators, both males and females, are painted in a dark gray color, but in some individuals the plumage color often acquires a blue tint. From below, the body of the birds is decorated with pale gray stripes and tinted with red, which creates a deceptive external impression of a red plumage color.

The description of sparrowhawks indicates their small size. Adult male birds reach lengths ranging from 30 to 35 cm with a wingspan of 60-65 cm.

Female sparrowhawks are twice as large as males, often exceeding length by 25%.

Female sparrowhawks grow in the range from 35 to 41 cm, and in the wingspan the length is up to 80 cm. The average weight of these birds is 185-345 g.

Short and wide wings, together with a long tail, help the birds to maneuver between forest trees.

Both in the younger generation and in adult birds, it is not uncommon to see a white spot of various shapes in the nape area.

Do not confuse the photo of the sparrow hawk with the goshawk, which it looks very similar to, allows the appearance of the tail: the sparrow hawk is longer, narrow at the base, and cut off straight at the end, without rounding.

Behavioral features

As such, the voice of the sparrowhawk is not heard. He is able to make only fast sounds like three times repeated “kick”, which he does extremely rarely, often his voice is heard only when there is a danger to the bird itself or its chicks.

Among the main hunting prey for sparrowhawks are small and medium-sized birds, among which there are also insectivores. They have a lot of titmouses, thrushes, and larks in the feed diet. Among the largest prey for them are pigeons. In addition to birds, hawks are capable of catching and eating small animals when hunting.

Ordinary sparrows often become the prey of sparrowhawks living within the city limits, therefore they are often called sparrows.

Among ornithologists, the hawk is distinguished by its ability to fiercely defend its nests and chicks from many predators larger than themselves. At the same time, when a person appears next to the tray with a chick, the female is able to rush at the troublemaker, flying around and attacking from behind, pecking right at the back of the head. At the same time, her attacks will be continuous until the alien dangerous for her leaves the location of the nest.

In fast and maneuverable flight, sparrowhawks alternate between flapping and gliding, and they rarely resort to soaring in mid-air.

If the sparrowhawk is not disturbed, then its nest for the next nesting year can be found in the same place or no further than 100-200 m from it. However, it will be completely new.

Coniferous branches serve as nest material, sometimes tree bark and dried grasses are used without the use of fresh branches, which distinguishes these birds from other hawk species.

The nest of a sparrowhawk is easy to detect by the particles of prey they left behind - the remains of birds that they ate themselves and fed the chick.

The brood of the female has 3-4 chicks, sometimes up to 6. Eggs with a matte white shell, covered with ocher or brown spots of various sizes and shapes. The size of each egg varies between 3.7-4.3 / 3.0-3.3 cm.

The incubation period for sparrowhawks lasts for about 30-32 days, and by the end of June or the beginning of July, chicks appear, which by the second half of August fledge.

- a relatively small feathered predator. Hawks nesting in Central and Southern Europe stay at home for the winter. Those who live on the northern edge of the continent fly to South Africa for the winter.

The unpretentious Sparrowhawk finds shelter in a variety of places. It can be found both in the valleys and high in the mountains (up to the upper border of the forest), but most often it settles to live in groves and forest edges next to fields, meadows, gardens and rural estates, choosing a young coniferous tree stand for its nest. Sometimes hawks also settle in deciduous groves overgrown with shrubs along the edges of fields, as well as in vast city parks and forest park areas.

Habitat. All Europe except Iceland and the northern tip of Scandinavia, as well as Asia and North Africa.

Species: Sparrowhawk - Accipiter nisus.
Family: Hawks.
Order: Diurnal birds of prey.
Class: Birds.
Subtype: Vertebrates.

Security.
Mass use of plant protection products in the 60s. led to a catastrophic reduction in the number of sparrowhawks. After the ban on the use of the most toxic herbicides was introduced in Central Europe, the population of these predators increased markedly. In some European countries, the sparrowhawk is protected by law.

Reproduction.
Sparrowhawks are among the birds that bring only one brood per year. The pair build a new nest each year in a young tree, choosing a location where the branches fuse with the trunk. In the midst of mating games, birds call to each other with a characteristic crying scream. In late April - early May, the female lays 4-6 white, brown-speckled eggs. A few days before laying the first egg, the male begins to feed his wife and diligently supplies her with food for the entire period of incubation. The female allows herself to leave the nest only for a couple of minutes and goes to the “kitchen”, where she receives neatly plucked prey from the male. After 33-36 days, chicks covered with white fluff hatch from the eggs, which remain in the nest for about a month. All this time, the female is inseparably with the babies - it warms them, covers them from the sun and rain, and in case of danger, bravely protects them from the enemy. In the first days of the life of the chicks, the father brings already plucked prey to the nest and gives it to the mother, who divides the offering and feeds the chicks. As soon as the babies grow up a little, the male begins to transfer prey to his girlfriend on the fly, without approaching the nest. If trouble happens to the mother during this period, the fry will inevitably die of starvation, since the father will be able to get plenty of game, but will not be able to feed the chicks. Two weeks after the appearance of the chick, the female also flies out to hunt. From this moment, the parents no longer tear the prey, but throw it entirely into the nest, leaving the chicks to deal with it on their own. On the 35th day, the grown-up kids already fly up to their parents when they bring food.

Lifestyle.
The main prey of the sparrowhawk is small birds: sparrows, finches, larks, titmouse and blackbirds, although female sparrowhawks sometimes attack pigeons. It is very difficult to see a predator in time, because he likes to attack from an ambush, but at the sight of an enemy, small birds immediately raise an alarming hubbub and rush in all directions. Having looked out for the victim, the sparrowhawk breaks off from a sheltered perch and rushes to the target on a strafing flight. In pursuit of prey, the hawk is mobile and agile, as befits an air ace. The attack is usually fleeting, because maneuverable flight requires a huge expenditure of energy. If the prey escapes from the first blow, the hawk loses interest in it and again hides in a shelter, and in case of a successful hunt, it takes the victim to a secluded corner, where, before eating, it methodically plucks it. The tendency to air "recklessness" is often fatal for the sparrowhawk, especially during the winter in the city. Having been carried away by the chase, hawks often crash into wires or break on window panes. You can only follow a sparrowhawk in flight for a tiny fraction of a second.

Did you know?

• The sparrowhawk plays an important role in regulating urban and field sparrow populations.
• In the past, there was a belief that the cuckoo turns into a hawk for the winter. Since all cuckoos migrate to Africa for the winter, hawks wintering in Europe were often mistaken for cuckoos because of their similar coloration.
• Sometimes the hawk attacks the birds in the cage standing on the windowsill without seeing the window pane. Since the predator rushes into battle without looking back, such an attack often ends in his death.
• From 50 to 70% of young sparrowhawks die in the first year of life, becoming victims of winter frosts and mutilations. Many fall prey to large hawks.
• During the incubation of the clutch, the female completely changes her plumage. Males who have to feed the family molt later and change their flight feathers gradually.

Sparrowhawk - Accipiter nisus.
Length: 30-40 cm.
Weight: 150-300 g.
Wingspan: 60-80 cm.
Number of eggs in clutch: 4-6.
Incubation period: 33-36 days.
Diet: Mainly birds of the passerine order.
Lifespan: up to 15 years.

Structure.
Plumage.
The ventral side is whitish with brown transverse stripes. In an adult male, the back is bluish-gray, the stripes on the abdomen are buffy. The dorsal side of the female is brown, and the stripes on the abdomen are darker. Wings.
The wings are rather short and wide, with rounded ends. Eyes.
The iris of the eyes is orange-yellow. Excellent vision allows the hawk to look out for prey from afar. Tail.
The tail is long, cut at a right angle. Beak.
The sharp yellow beak is hooked and well adapted to plucking and tearing the body of the prey. Paws. Tarsus of long yellow paws are covered with feathers. The fingers are armed with sharp claws.

related species.
Hawks belong to the hawk family. Buzzards, kites and vultures of the Old World (Europe, Asia and Africa), as well as eagles, harriers, ospreys and hawks. This is the largest family of raptors. 50 species of hawks live in forests and copses around the world.