Eurasian Sparrowhawk

Accipiter nisus

Threads through dense woodland at full speed to snatch songbirds. Your message arrives faster than the eye.

Population: ~1.5 million individuals globally (est. 2009); Animal Diversity Web independently states 'over one million breeding pairs worldwide' with stable/increasing trend across most of Europe
Habitat: Woodland edges, especially coniferous or mixed forest, increasingly also parks, gardens, and other urban green spaces
Fun fact: Eurasian Sparrowhawks show one of the most pronounced size differences between sexes of any bird of prey, with females up to 25% larger and roughly double the weight of males, letting a breeding pair exploit a much wider range of prey sizes than either sex could alone.
Range: Widespread across temperate and subtropical parts of the Old World, from Europe and North Africa across Asia
Diet: Almost exclusively small-to-medium woodland birds (males take tits, finches, and sparrows up to ~40g; larger females take thrushes, starlings, and even young pigeons up to ~150-500g depending on source), caught in short surprise attacks
Size: 0.35 m
Wingspan: 0.7 m
Lifespan: 20 years

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