GABAR 19:1 May 2009 Juvenile Forest Buzzard in Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park

William S. Clark

P. O. Box 531467, Harlingen, Texas 78550 USA

Key words: Forest Buzzard, dispersal, vagrancy

I saw and took photographs of a very lightly marked juvenile Forest Buzzard trizonatus in the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, Northern Cape Province in August 2001, far outside of its normal range. This raptor, shown in Figs. 1-3, is clearly a buzzard, and shows the dark ‘buzzard patch’ on its nape that is typical of in this genus (Fig. 1).

Fig 1. Juvenile Forest Buzzard. Dark ‘buzzard patch’ of this genus is visible on the nape. 28 GABAR 19:1 May 2009 The markings on its underparts are dark brown spots and short broad streaks, consistent with those found on this species (Figs. 1-3). Only three other species of buzzards are likely to occur in this park: Steppe, Augur, and Jackal Buzzards (Hustler & Ryan 2005). It is clearly not a juvenile Jackal, as it shows no rufous on the underparts. Juvenile Steppes would show narrower and longer dark streaks on the underparts, almost never as lightly marked as this individual, as well as dark markings on the legs and underwing coverts. Juvenile Augurs can show similar markings but nevertheless differ. They would show a dark crown and wide dark malar stripes and patterned uppersides of the secondaries, features not seen on this buzzard.

Fig 2. Juvenile Forest Buzzard. Underwings are atypically almost unmarked.

Juvenile Forest Buzzards are recorded to disperse to the north-east of the breeding range (Allen 1992, Hustler & Ryan 2005). This record is interesting because it is far from the usual dispersal area of this species along the escarpment of . 29 GABAR 19:1 May 2009 References Allen, D. 1992. Long distance movements of Forest Buzzards in . Gabar 7:26-27. Hustler, K. & W. J. R. Dean. 2005. Forest Buzzard. In: Hockey, P. A. R., Dean, W. R. J., Ryan, P. G. (eds) Roberts’ birds of southern Africa. Pp 522-523. John Voelcker Book Fund, Black Eagle Publishing, Cape Town.

Fig 3. Juvenile Forest Buzzard. Dark eye-line and dark markings on the underparts are typical for this species. Secondaries are uniform in coloration. Note the lack of dark crown and wide dark malar stripe. 30