close quarters

Accipiters and Cape Buzzards breeding on the Cape Peninsula

- MARGARET MACIVER

Rob Little’s article ‘Space In-vaders’ (July/August 2020 issue) detailed the tussle among three Accipiter species (Black and Rufousbreasted sparrowhawks and African Goshawk) nesting on the Cape Peninsula. Rob’s account described what I too was witnessing in the remnant of a pine plantation in Tokai, outside Cape Town. Before the majority of the plantation was felled, each species had more than one nest and they all had sufficient space to avoid conflict.

Now that only 25.5 hectares of the plantation remains, a space race between the species is evident. Fortunately, since Black Sparrowhawks in the Western Cape breed in winter, they are usually teaching their offspring to hunt by the time the Rufous-breasted Sparrowhawks and African Goshawks begin their summer breeding season.

From time to time I had seen a pair of Rufous-breasted Sparrowhawks in a stand of pines, but once that was felled I had no idea if they had moved into the only section remaining or had deserted the area. However, in September 2018, while checking on juvenile Black Sparrowhawks, I heard a pair of Rufous-breasted Sparrowhawks calling within the pine trees. Following their softcalls, I found them building a nest near the centre of the plantation. They raised a brood of three chicks that fledged in late summer and they again nested nearby during the summer of 2019. Also in 2018, while strolling on the eastern edge of the plantation, I saw a female African Goshawk perched on a fairly low branch. Before I could lift my camera, a male flew in from behind me, landed on the female and copulated with her. He then disappeared just as quickly out of the pine tree area, but to my delight soon returned carrying a stick that he took up to a nest, high in a pine tree.