Hawks fishing on the Pixiam River. One of the highlights of a boat trip on the Pixiam River in the Pantanal, Brazil is having the boatsman throw fish for the local birds to swoop down and pick them from the river. Watching Great Black Hawks and Black-collared Hawks pluck fish from the river with ease is a wonderful sight to behold. Interestingly, Cocoi Herons have also learned that the boats mean food and they have changed behaviour to take advantage of an easy meal. It is not an easy task to capture these events on film.
Black-collared Hawks and Great Black Hawks have a wing spans of 1.25m.The former stand about 50cm tall whilst the latter are about 60 cm. Beautiful birds!