Habitat and Diet
This hawk lives mainly on insects such as locusts and giant centipedes, as well as small lava lizards, snakes, and rodents. It is not uncommon for it to take young marine and land iguanas, and sea turtle and tortoise hatchlings. This predator has also been spotted near nesting areas of Swallow-tailed Gulls, where it steals eggs as well as young. Even extremely rancid carrion is picked apart by their sharp, forceful beaks. Their feet and talons are also strong like those of the closely related Red-backed Hawk and White-tailed Hawk.
Hunting in groups of two or three, the hawks soar at a height of 50 to 200 meters in the sky. When one of the birds spots prey or a rotting carcass, they signal to the other members. The dominant hawk of the group feeds from the prey until it is satisfied, as the other hawks in the family group submissively wait their turn to feed. It prefers to perch on a lava outcrop or high branch when hunting, yet it also spends some of its time on the ground.
Fearless of man, the young especially being quite curious, they often wander around human camps and scavenge for scraps of food. In 1845, Charles Darwin wrote:
"A gun is here almost superfluous; for with the muzzle I pushed a hawk out of the branch of a tree..."
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