Gray-faced Buzzard
Butastur indicus
- KingdomAnimalia (Animals)
- PhylumChordata (Chordates)
- ClassAves (Birds)
- OrderAccipitriformes (Hawks, Eagles, Kites, and Allies)
- FamilyAccipitridae (Hawks, Eagles, and Kites)
- GenusButastur (Butastur Buzzards)
- SpeciesButastur indicus (Gray-faced Buzzard)
About the Gray-faced Buzzard
The grey-faced buzzard (Butastur indicus) is an Asian bird of prey. It is typically 41–46 cm (16–18 in) in length, making it a small-sized raptor. It breeds in Manchuria, Korea and Japan; it winters in South-east Asia. It is a bird of open land. It eats lizards, small mammals and large insects.
The adult has a grey head, breast and neck, white throat, black moustaches and mesial stripes, brown back and upperwings, and brown bars on white underparts and underwings. The juvenile is brown and mottled above, pale below with brown streaks, and has a broad white supercilium and brown face.
The gray-faced buzzard was formally described in 1788 by the German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin in his revised and expanded edition of Carl Linnaeus's Systema Naturae. He placed it with the eagles, hawks and relatives in the genus Falco and coined the binomial name Falco indicus. Gmelin based his account on the "Javan hawk" that had been described in 1781 by John Latham from a specimen in the Leverian collection that had been obtained in February 1780 at Princes Island off the westernmost cape of Java during Captain Cook's last voyage. The gray-faced buzzard is now one of four species... Wikipedia →
Closest Relatives at Tangkoko Nature Reserve
Sulawesi Hawk-Eagle
Nisaetus lanceolatus
White-Bellied Sea-Eagle
Haliaeetus leucogaster
Brahminy Kite
Haliastur indus
Sulawesi Serpent-Eagle
Spilornis rufipectus
Rufous-bellied Eagle
Lophotriorchis kienerii
Sulawesi Honey-buzzard
Pernis celebensis
Black Eagle
Ictinaetus malayensis
Spotted Harrier
Circus assimilis
Oriental Honey-buzzard
Pernis ptilorhynchus
Osprey
Pandion haliaetus
Global Distribution
Where this species is recorded worldwide. Restricted to human observations from 2019 onwards — the same kind of record and the same period the probabilities on this page are built from, so collar-tracking studies, camera-trap arrays and museum specimens are excluded. Around Santa Rosa that removes 5,924 GPS fixes from a handful of tagged jaguars.
where this species is recorded (GBIF density — it tracks where observers go, not how likely a sighting is) · parks where it occurs — tap a pin for the sighting probability there
Parks Where Found
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kaeng Krachan National Park | 🇹🇭 Thailand | |
| 2 | Khao Luang National Park | 🇹🇭 Thailand | |
| 3 | Cuc Phuong National Park | 🇻🇳 Vietnam | |
| 4 | Khao Yai National Park | 🇹🇭 Thailand | |
| 5 | Khao Sok National Park | 🇹🇭 Thailand | |
| 6 | Doi Inthanon National Park | 🇹🇭 Thailand | |
| 7 | Taroko National Park | 🇹🇼 Taiwan | |
| 8 | Cat Tien National Park | 🇻🇳 Vietnam | |
| 9 | Tangkoko Nature Reserve | 🇮🇩 Indonesia | |
| 10 | Nikko National Park | 🇯🇵 Japan | |
| 11 | Kinabatangan Wildlife Sanctuary | 🇲🇾 Malaysia |