Eurasian Hobby

Falco subbuteo

Catches swifts and swallows in mid-air at full speed. Only a falcon this fast could intercept their flight.

Population: Widespread and numerous across its Palearctic breeding range; no single precise global figure corroborated across directly-fetched sources (IUCN/BirdLife assess overall population trend as stable)
Habitat: Open country with scattered trees — farmland, heathland, marshes, taiga edge, and savannah — used for both hunting and nesting in old corvid or raptor nests
Fun fact: The Eurasian Hobby is fast and agile enough to catch swifts and swallows outright in flight, a feat almost no other raptor of its size can match.
Range: Breeds across temperate Eurasia (the Palearctic, from Britain and Iberia to Japan); nominate population winters in sub-Saharan/southern Africa and southern Asia, while F. s. streichi is resident from Myanmar to south China and northern Indochina; rare vagrant to North America and occasionally Australia and Brazil
Diet: Aerial hunter of large flying insects (especially dragonflies) and small birds (e.g., swallows, swifts, martins) caught on the wing, occasionally small bats
Size: 0.325 m
Wingspan: 0.79 m
Lifespan: 14.9 years

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