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Here is the next annual gallery of pictures taken in Kiev, Chernihiv and Sumy Regions of Northern Ukraine in 2016. Short-toed Eagles of local pairs monitored during more than 10 years are captured in them. All the birds are indicated in captions by a letter and a year of the first representation in photo galleries on our site, starting with A11 – the old, very striped and dark-spotted, rather small but aggressive female living in the Mizhrichynskyi Nature Park /map/.

This video is a compilation of various short parts of the filming done in Northern Ukraine during the last year’s season from spring to fall. The shown moments of Short-toed Eagles’ life are provided with explanatory subtitles. The second part of the annual photo gallery contains descriptions of behaviour and habits of local STEs as well. Please see them under each presented picture.

How different reproduction of different pairs can be? Some adult Short-toed Eagles occupy the same sites from year to year. They had yet been identified in 2011 by photos taken since 2006 and according to previous and new observations. The birds had got indexes A11, B11 etc. although, in spoken communication we give them more harmonious names: for example, K11 is Barry, B11 is Ospry, and so on. Then later pictures of the individuals repeatedly got into the annual photo galleries. The natural identifying details are general plumage patterns, shapes of heads, wings, beaks and general silhouettes in flight from certain angles as well as signs of moulting. The number of the examined images should be enough to select the details and to collate them. Thus, now it is possible to compare the mean reproduction – – of pairs of individuals identified from year to year for certain, definitely without replacements of mates and without clear differences in objective conditions for breeding.

There are some fresh videos for April: three of them have been made with the camera installed at a nest of Short-toed Eagles in Israel /map/ by Guilad Friedemann.

The last two ones were taken from a distance in Northern Ukraine /map/ by me. Please note that all the clips are available in HD quality.

Observations of Short-toed Eagles in Northern Ukraine in 2014 which deserve to be noted:

• K. PISMENNYI, 2015 – Data on breeding of Short-toed Eagle in Northern Ukraine – , XLS file with formulas – ; Replacement of the biggest 14 flight feathers – ; Some short notes on Short-toed Eagles in Northern Ukraine in 2014 // short-toed-eagle.net (En).

These fragments of Short-toed Eagles’ flights have been shot at their breeding territories and hunting grounds in Kiev Region /map/ and in Mizhrichynskyi Park /map/ this year. The video is commented on, please, pay attention on subtitles. You can see eagles A11, B11, K11 and L11 in the clip. Certainly, also other more melodious names were given them for routine use. These STEs occupy their breeding sites within the same home ranges from year to year since at least 2006 and 2010. For a regular observer every bird has obvious individual traits. The video without compression can be downloaded.

Monitoring of 9 different pairs of Short-toed Eagles has been conducted during 10 years in Northern Ukraine (Kiev Region /map/, Mizhrichynskyi Park /map/ of Chernihiv Region, southern part of Sumy Polissya /map/). Some calculations and results of the monitoring are represented in tabular forms:

• K. PISMENNYI, 2013 – Some data on breeding of Short-toed Eagle in Northern Ukraine // short-toed-eagle.net – ; in the form of XLS file with formulas: (En).

Average breeding success amounts to 0.60 juvenile / territorial pair and is quite close to this index for France: 0.57. The last result is based on observations of 2835 (!) breeding cases which have been managed to make by French national Circaetus gallicus network for 11 years (Bernard Joubert, personal communication). Also some other conclusions can be made: old pines (Pinus sylvestris) are prefered by Short-toed Eagles for nesting in Northern Ukraine; the eagles more often change their nests than they successfully breed; nest height is highly variable; the eagles’ choice of a nest depends on their previous breeding success; after an unsuccessful season the nest is changed with high probability, after successful one the following choice of a nest is unpredictable.