The Dark Chanting Goshawk (Melierax metabates) is a bird of prey in the family Accipitridae. The Accipitridae also include many other diurnal raptors such as kites, eagles and harriers.
This hawk breeds in sub-Saharan Africa, but avoids the rain forests of the Congo basin. There is a small and declining isolated population in Morocco, and it also occurs in Saudi Arabia and Yemen.
It is a resident species of tropical and subtropical savannah. It builds a stick nest in a tree and lays one or two eggs. It eats a variety of vertebrate prey and large insects.
The Dark Chanting Goshawk is a large, long-tailed, broad-winged hawk, with a 105 cm wingspan. It is slate-grey above and white with fine barring below. The tail is black and white. In flight, the wings are grey with black tips. The flight is stiff and mechanical.
This species derives its name from the breeding season song, which consists of chanted flutes and whistles.
Famous quotes containing the words dark and/or chanting:
“This, it will be remembered, was the scene of Mrs. Rowlandson’s capture, and of other events in the Indian wars, but from this July afternoon, and under that mild exterior, those times seemed as remote as the irruption of the Goths. They were the dark age of New England.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Along the avenue of cypresses,
All in their scarlet cloaks and surplices
Of linen, go the chanting choristers,
The priests in gold and black, the villagers. . . .”
—D.H. (David Herbert)