Circaetus gallicus information navigator

Systema Naturae is a website developed by Vincenzo Rizzo Pinna. He studies birds of prey including Short-toed Eagles in the Maremma Regional Park /map/ and in other places. Let us show you a little gallery of unique video clips (see them below) dedicated to Short-toed Eagles in the Maremma park and also some photos.

In the first video you can see Francesco Petretti /map/. He is a prominent Italian ornithologist and researcher of Short-toed Eagle, he took part in the creation of the “L’Aquila dei serpenti” film. Also you can enjoy all videos uploaded by Vincenzo directly on YouTube.

Please take a look at the map of main survey area /map/. General description and photos can be viewed below:

The zone has principally horizontal landscape. Large mainly pine man-made forests with oaks, birches and other leafy trees. Many not big rivers and wetlands. Big pieces of water, such as the Dnieper River with the Kiev Reservoir and some of the Dnieper’s tributaries: the Desna and the Pripyat Rivers. Rivers floodplanes are traditionally used as pastures for cows mainly and as grasslands.
Species of the potential prey: Natrix natrix – the most numerous, apparently is staple food of Short-toed Eagle, also sporadical Vipera berus and extremely rare Coronella austriaca; some species of lizards: Anguis fragilis – common, Lacerta agilis – the most numerous.

Typical breeding territories: old thin dry parts of pine forests. Nests on pines, usually near the tops, sometimes in “witch’s broom”. There are a lot of cutover areas inside the forestlands. A range of known the nest situation heights: 13-33 m.

Typical hunting territories: large open areas situated close to various pieces of water, such as floodplanes of big and small rivers, grounds nearby marshes and drain channels – usual inhabitations of Grass Snake and lizards.

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Three texts dedicated to Short-toed Eagle are presented here. They all are in different formats and knit together by the authors (Guido Premuda, Luca Baghino & Marco Gustin), by a territory of the researches (Italy) /map/ and by year of issue (2006):

• Luciano RUGGIERI, Guido PREMUDA, Luca BAGHINO, Luca GIRAUDO, 2006 – Esperienza di monitoraggio su vasta scala della migrazione autunnale del Biancone Circaetus gallicus in Italia e nel Mediterraneo centrale [A large-scale survey of the autumn migration of Short-toed Eagles across Italy and the Central Mediterranean] // Avocetta, 30: 76-80. – (It) (source – EBN Italia website).

• Luca BAGHINO, Guido PREMUDA, 2006 – Consistente migrazione pre-riproduttiva del Biancone Circaetus gallicus lungo il versante tirrenico ligure-toscano [Substantial pre-reproductive migration of the Short-toed Eagle along the Tyrrhenian coast of Liguria and Tuscany] // Rete Natura 2000 in Liguria: Pubblicazioni – (It) (source – Parco del Beigua website).

• Luca BAGHINO, Marco GUSTIN, 2006 – Censimenti dei flussi migratori dei rapaci diurni e altri grandi veleggiatori in transito nella ZPS “Beigua-Turchino” // Rete Natura 2000, Parco del Beigua – (It) (source – Parco del Beigua website).

The last work concerns Short-toed Eagle among other Raptors.

This is just a little excursion through Short-toed Eagles’ nesting zones, hunting territories and other places and things, connected with them somehow in Kiev Region (central Ukraine) /map/. We would like to invite you to feel Short-toed Eagles’ world through these images.

We have transformed some articles from the Sunbird.it (see the post Guido Premuda’s works) into the form that is suitable for the machine translation:

• PREMUDA G., 2002 – Primi dati sulla migrazione post-riproduttiva del Biancone, Circaetus gallicus, nelle Alpi Apuane [Autumn migration of Short-toed Eagle in the Apuane Alps] // Rivista Italiana di Ornitologia, 71(2): 181-186. (It).

• AGOSTINI N., BAGHINO L., COLEIRO C., CORBI F. & PREMUDA G., 2002 – Circuitous autumn migration in Short-toed Eagle Circaetus gallicus // Journal of Raptor Research., 36(2): 111-114. (En).

• PREMUDA G., 2004 – La migrazione del Biancone Circaetus gallicus in Italia: stato delle conoscenze attuali [The Short-toed Eagle migration in Italy: current state of knowledge]. In: Atti del Convegno “Rapaci in volo verso l’Appennino” // Corpo Forestale dello Stato – Gestione ex ASFD di Lucca – Riserva Naturale Statale dell’Orecchiella, 21-24. (It).

• PREMUDA G., 2004 – Osservazione di un dormitorio di Biancone, Circaetus gallicus, e considerazioni sul piumaggio degli immaturi [Observation of a roost composed of seven individuals of Short-toed Eagle and notes about plumage of immatures] // Rivista Italiana di Ornitologia, 74(1): 76-80. (It).

You can find here a possibility to get some information (It) about the film of Emanuele Coppola “L’Aquila dei serpenti” and to try to order it on the site. The preview file has a size near of 2.7 MB, it’s in wmv-format (source – the Natura in Diretta website). Read also about the Panda Film’s birth. The film was made with participation of Francesco Petretti /map/.

Please read the text written by Guido Premuda together with Andrea Corso dedicated to determination of Short-toed Eagle’s age and sex by plumage characters: Il piumaggio del Biancone: età, sesso e morfismo (It) which could be used as a hand book for the field work.
Also the photo and a list of full texts of Premuda’s articles dedicated to Short-toed Eagle can be found here (the source is his own website – Sunbird.it):

• PREMUDA G., 2004 – Prime osservazioni della migrazione primaverile “a circuito” del Biancone, Circaetus gallicus, nelle Alpi Apuane // Rivista Italiana di Ornitologia, 74 (2): 119-124. – (It).

• PREMUDA G., 2004 – Osservazione di un dormitorio di Biancone, Circaetus gallicus, e considerazioni sul piumaggio degli immaturi // Rivista Italiana di Ornitologia, 74(1): 76-80. – (It) (translatable form).

• PREMUDA G., 2004 – La migrazione del Biancone Circaetus gallicus in Italia: stato delle conoscenze attuali. In: Atti del Convegno “Rapaci in volo verso l’Appennino” // Corpo Forestale dello Stato – Gestione ex ASFD di Lucca – Riserva Naturale Statale dell’Orecchiella, 21-24. – (It) (translatable form).

• AGOSTINI N., BAGHINO L., PANUCCIO M., PREMUDA G. & PROVENZA A., 2004 – The autumn migration strategies of adult and juvenile short-toed eagles Circaetus gallicus in the central Mediterranean // Avocetta, 28: 25-28. – (En).

• PREMUDA G., 2002 – Primi dati sulla migrazione post-riproduttiva del Biancone, Circaetus gallicus, nelle Alpi Apuane // Rivista Italiana di Ornitologia, 71(2): 181-186. – (It) (translatable form).

• AGOSTINI N., BAGHINO L., COLEIRO C., CORBI F. & PREMUDA G., 2002 – Circuitous autumn migration in Short-toed Eagle Circaetus gallicus // Journal of Raptor Research., 36(2): 111-114. – (En) (translatable form).

• AGOSTINI N., BAGHINO L., PANUCCIO, M. & PREMUDA G., 2002 – A conservative strategy in migrating Short-toed Eagles Circaetus gallicus // Ardeola, 49(2): 287-291. – (En).