diagnostics
44-49 cm, 430-570 g. A long-winged, long-tailed brown wetland raptor. Little sexual dimorphism, although adult females have slightly darker plumage than males. Upperparts dark brown with feathers edged rufous. Underparts lighter brown with white and brown streaking on throat, breast and flanks. Upperwings dark brown while coverts have white flecking. Underwings pale buff, with obvious barring and are dark tips. Tail light brown with dark barring. Bill grey with dull yellow cere. Eyes, legs, and feet yellow. Juveniles darker than adults, with creamy colouration on nape, forehead, shoulders and upperwing coverts although the extent of this colouration is variable. Eyes dark brown, while cere is green-yellow (Simmons 2005).
trophic
This species is dependent on permanent wetlands, both inland and coastal, for breeding, feeding and roosting. It also hunts over drier floodplains, grasslands, croplands, and Fynbos, where it preys mainly on small rodents (Simmons 2005), as well as birds, reptiles, frogs and insects. Nests are usually placed in reedbeds over water, although breeding has been recorded in adjacent sedges, Fynbos, scrub and agricultural fields, but these are considered to be rare occurrences (Kemp and Kemp 2006). Breeding adults are largely sedentary (Simmons 2005) with pairs often retaining the same territory year after year (Simmons 1990), while juveniles disperse widely. The generation length of 7.8 years was calculated from the mean of two calculated values derived from published and/or extrapolated estimates of mean age at first breeding, maximum longevity in the wild and mean annual adult survival (BirdLife International 2014).
