UK Green Adventures: The Great Bird Hunt – Species 31-35
Let’s get down to the serious birds.
As promised here are some great tips for identifying some of the UK’s most common and widespread birds of prey.
These don’t include the owls who will have their own post later in the series, but cover some of our most well known raptors; some hunt live prey (mainly other birds) while others are mainly scavengers, searching along roadsides for their next meal.
It is always a pleasure to see a raptor soaring overhead as they have a certain menace and beauty to them at the same time. And their silhoutettes let you know that they don’t mind being seen – they don’t hide away like most garden birds…..
So let’s get started with the only hovering bird in the UK.
Kestrel:
These smaller birds of prey are often seen at roadsides and along field edges – magically floating in the air. They are the most likely of the 5 birds in this article to be seen on your commute to work!

photo credit: jim kelly3
They are reddish in colour on their back with black tips to their almost pointed wings. They fly with a long, straight tail – also with a black tip – however when hovering over it’s prey – usually small mammals – the tail feathers will be spread open in a fan.
Merlin:
Smaller than the kestrel and not so easy to see unless you are in the thick of the countryside. Rather than roadsides and fields, these birds are more likely to be over woodlands, coasts and heathland chasing their avian prey!
They have sharply pointed wings and a long barred tail – perfect for fast pursuits through the air chasing birds. However they are dull browns and greys with no really distinct features, so you have to identify them on their behaviour (fast swooping flight) and where you see them – or get a good look and rule out Hobbies and Perigrines which both have a white chin and throat.
Sparrowhawk:
As its name suggests, this bird is also a bird-eater – but does so in urban areas too – so you have a good chance of seeing one in your garden or walking through town. However, they fly so fast that you might not actually see them very clearly at all, but this behaviour alone is enough to identify them. I have witnessed many a garden bird attack without having even seen the bird approaching as they tend to fly low as they get closer and then surprise their prey (and me).

photo credit: Chester Zoo
ID wise, their pale breasts sport a concentrated pattern of horizontal stipes and their backs are very plain grey in colour if seen perched – if in flight you may spot the very long banded tail and the stripy underside with relatively blunt wings held slightly bent.
Common Buzzard:
These birds are becoming more and more numerous in the countryside and just on the outskirts of towns too. They are large birds in flight and tend to fly with their broad long wings held outstretched – you may only ever see them gliding.
Usually seen in pairs, they scout the landscape from on high looking for carrion – and as a result are commonly seen being harrassed by crows – who they loosely compete with for this food source. If you get a closer look, you will notice the single primary feathers sticking out of the wingtip (the fingers) as well as a noticable change in patterning between the main body and ‘forearms’ and the longer primary and secondary feathers.
There are plenty of other large birds in the UK with these 2 key features, but without binoculars you can never tell and so always assume it was the most likely suspect rather than a Golden Eagle! With binoculars look out for the black outline to the wings and the paler band across the coverts!
Red Kite:
One of the most majestic of ‘common’ birds of prey in the UK – and so large and brightly coloured that you won’t mistake it once you have seen it.
Even if it is high in the sky and you have only the naked eye – once it has fanned its tail and you have seen that unmistakable deep fork – there is nothing else it could be.

photo credit: Noel Reynolds
With a wingspan of over 1 and a half metres and with a reddish appearance this bird a real joy to find – and that isn’t always so difficult these days with red kites being spotted over most of the UK – I even saw one in an industrial estate car park on the ground. However they aren’t so common in the south-east yet – but they do make the odd appearance!
So, how many of these have you already seen and can now identify almost everytime? There are of course 11 other raptors in the UK which share some of their features and can look very similar to the novice bird watcher – like the rare Hobby and the elusive Goshawk – but it is very unlikely that you will see one in the first place. But even if you did – experts probably wouldn’t believe you anyway; I mean do you know what a carpel or a supercilium is? How about an alula or a tertial tip?
How about Seagulls next time? Surely they are a lot easier…..
See you soon…..



















