Oriental Hobby

The Oriental hobby is a falcon 27–30cm long. Adults are rich orange-red below and bluish-grey above, with a black hood and a pale throat, and like other hobbies have bright yellow legs, eye-ring and cere. The sexes look alike, and juveniles have black streaks on a rufous breast and a mottled back. It differs from the Eurasian hobby in its wholly orange-red underparts and from the Australian hobby in having more black on the head, the black moustache merging into the black nape (Wikipedia, general species account).

It lives in lowland forest and woodland and feeds mainly on insects and birds, rarely catching bats. It nests in the used nests of other birds, in trees, on building ledges or on cliffs, and breeds from May to August. Its range is patchy, stretching from the northern Indian subcontinent and eastern Himalayas across southern China and the Philippines to New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. SoIB 2023 lists it as a resident forest bird in India with local movements and a restricted range, has too little data for a trend and rates it a Moderate conservation priority (Wikipedia, general species account; SoIB 2023).