Western osprey
| Western osprey | |
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| Nominate osprey subspecies from Nagarhole National Park. | |
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Not evaluated (IUCN 3.1)
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| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Aves |
| Order: | Accipitriformes |
| Family: | Pandionidae |
| Genus: | Pandion |
| Species: | P. haliaetus |
| Binomial name | |
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Pandion haliaetus (Linnaeus, 1758) |
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The western osprey (Pandion haliaetus) is a diurnal, fish-eating bird of prey. It is a large raptor, reaching more than 60 cm (24 in) in length and 180 cm (71 in) across the wings. It is brown on the upperparts and predominantly greyish on the head and underparts.
Most taxonomic authorites lump this species and the eastern osprey together (called the osprey), but some (including the International Ornithologists' Union separate them.
The western osprey tolerates a wide variety of habitats, nesting in any location near a body of water providing an adequate food supply.
As its other common names suggest, the western osprey's diet consists almost exclusively of fish. It possesses specialised physical characteristics and exhibits unique behaviour to assist in hunting and catching prey. As a result of these unique characteristics, it has been given its own taxonomic genus, Pandion and family, Pandionidae.
The western osprey was one of the many species described by Carl Linnaeus in his 18th-century work, Systema Naturae, and named as Falco haliaeetus. The genus Pandion was described by the French zoologist Marie Jules César Savigny in 1809.
The western osprey differs in several respects from other diurnal birds of prey. Its toes are of equal length, its tarsi are reticulate, and its talons are rounded, rather than grooved. The western osprey and owls are the only raptors whose outer toe is reversible, allowing them to grasp their prey with two toes in front and two behind. This is particularly helpful when they grab slippery fish. Some schemes place it alongside the hawks and eagles in the family Accipitridae—which itself can be regarded as making up the bulk of the order Accipitriformes or else be lumped with the Falconidae into Falconiformes. The Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy has placed it together with the other diurnal raptors in a greatly enlarged Ciconiiformes, but this results in an unnatural paraphyletic classification.
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Wikipedia