Description:

A smallish accipiter with lightly marked thighs and lower underparts. Male has pale blue-grey upperparts, indistinct grey gular stripe, fine brownish-orange barring on underparts, unbarred white thighs, and unbarred or only lightly barred central tail feathers. Upperparts of female are more brownish grey.

Distribution:

Uncommon resident and summer visitor to the southern areas of Diamer and Gilgit districts. Wide range of open woodland, scrub forest, wooded cultivations and forest edges. Essentially a lowland species rarely above 2500m.

Behavior:

Hunts mainly from a perch within vegetation, making a short dash to take prey on a trunk, in foliage or on ground. Rarely makes aerial pursuits. Forceful and short surprise attacks on prey. Changes perch with low flap and glide flight. Mainly preys on small birds and reptiles, even small gamebirds; also nestlings, eggs, bats, rodents, frogs and insects and rarely carrion.

Photo Gallery:

Range & Occurrence:

Resident Species

Summer Breeder

Winter Visitor

Passage Migrant

Distribution Map of Shikra in Gilgit-Baltistan (Status: )

Seasonal Occurrence of Shikra

Resources:

Birds of Pakistan: Helm Field Guides (R. Grimmett & T. Inskipp)
The Birds of Pakistan (T. J. Roberts)
Birds of the Indian Subcontinent (C. Inskipp, R. Grimmett & T. Inskipp)
Birds of South Asia: The Ripley Guide (P. Rasmussen & J. Anderton)
Birds of India: Collins Field Guide (N. Arlott)
Handbook of the Birds of India and Pakistan (S. Ali & S. D. Ripley)
Handbook of the Birds of the World (https://www.hbw.com)
The Clements Checklist of Birds of the World, 6th Edition
iNaturalist BoGB (inaturalist.org/projects/birds-of-gilgit-baltistan)
Birds of Gilgit-Baltistan (http://fb.me/birdsgb)

*Gallery images on this page are shared from flickr.com, and are copyrighted to their respective creators or owners.