Crested Caracara

The crested caracara is a bird of prey in the falcon family, found from the southern United States through Mexico and most of mainland Latin America to Tierra del Fuego, with an isolated population on the Falkland Islands. Adaptable, it lives in open and semi-open habitats from desert to coast and is often found near people. A bold opportunist, it is often seen walking on the ground looking for food, mainly feeding on carcasses but also stealing from other raptors, raiding nests and taking live prey from insects to small mammals, birds and reptiles. It has a dark cap, a barred whitish-buff chest and bare yellow to reddish-orange facial skin.

About the crested caracara

The crested caracara is a large bird of prey in the falcon family, Falconidae, that lives largely as a scavenger. It feeds mostly on carrion, often walking on the ground to find food, and ranges from the southern United States through Mexico and Central America to the southern tip of South America.

Caracara plancus was first named Falco plancus in 1777, and the species name is Latin for "eagle." It was later placed in the genus Polyborus before moving to its own genus, Caracara. The word "caracara" traces back to the Old Tupi language of Brazil and probably imitates the bird's call. Two subspecies are recognized: the northern crested caracara, which ranges from the southern United States to northern South America and was once treated as a separate species, and the southern form, found from Peru and Brazil to Tierra del Fuego.

This is a big falcon. Adults measure 50 to 65 cm (20–26 in) long, with a wingspan of 120 to 132 cm (47–52 in), and weigh 0.9 to 1.6 kg (2–3.5 lb). Birds from the colder south of the range average larger than tropical birds, and they are the largest of all caracaras. By average body mass, the crested caracara is the second-largest falcon in the world, behind only the gyrfalcon.

The plumage is bold and easy to read. The cap, belly, thighs, most of the wings and the tail tip are dark brown. The face, throat and nape are whitish-buff, and the chest, neck, back and base of the tail are whitish-buff barred with dark brown. In flight, a large pale patch, or "window," shows near each wingtip.

The face is the standout feature. The legs are yellow, and the bare skin of the face and the cere above the bill range from deep yellow to reddish-orange. That facial color can change with the bird's mood. Juveniles look like paler adults with streaked chests and backs, gray legs and whitish facial skin that later turns pinkish-purple.

Behavior and diet

The crested caracara is a bold opportunist that spends a lot of time on the ground, walking around in search of food. Carrion makes up most of its diet. It also raids bird and reptile nests and takes live prey when it can, mostly insects and small animals such as small mammals, small birds, amphibians, reptiles, fish, crabs and other shellfish, worms and maggots. Prey can be as large as a snowy egret. It sometimes eats fruit.

Theft is a big part of its strategy. At carcasses, it dominates both the black vulture and the turkey vulture. It also chases and harasses hawks, brown pelicans, ibises and spoonbills until they drop or cough up their food.

Caracaras have learned to use human and natural disturbances. They pick off animals flushed by wildfires, cattle and farm machinery, and some have learned to follow trains or cars for scraps thrown out. Because of this, they actively seek out signs of easy food, such as smoke from a wildfire or vultures circling overhead.

A crested caracara is usually solitary, though several may gather at a large food source such as a dump. In the southern part of the range, breeding takes place in the Southern Hemisphere spring and summer, while timing is looser in warmer regions. The nest is a large, open platform, usually on top of a tree or palm and sometimes on the ground. The usual clutch is two eggs.

One odd behavior has been recorded several times: black vultures approaching and preening crested caracaras. In every case, the caracara starts it by bowing its head, apparently inviting the vulture to groom it.

Range and habitat

The crested caracara ranges from Tierra del Fuego and southern Chile north through South America, Central America and Mexico, where it occurs in every state, to the southern United States. In the U.S., the northern subspecies lives in Texas, Florida, Arizona, New Mexico, Louisiana and southern California. An isolated population lives on the Falkland Islands, and the bird also lives on Caribbean islands including Cuba and Trinidad, and nests in the southern Caribbean on Aruba, Curaçao and Bonaire.

It is a highly adaptable species. It uses almost any open or semi-open habitat, including semi-desert, coasts, plains, swamps, subtropical and tropical forest, temperate regions and even cities, and is often found near people. It avoids the high Andes and dense humid forest such as the Amazon, where it sticks to open areas along major rivers. In Texas, it has become more common in the central and northern parts of the state.

Florida has a relict population that dates back to the last glacial period, when an oak savanna covered the Gulf Coast. As the climate warmed and that savanna disappeared, caracaras held on in the prairies of central Florida and the marshes along the St. Johns River. Today they are most common in DeSoto, Glades, Hendry, Highlands, Okeechobee and Osceola counties, where they prefer to nest in cabbage palmettos and sometimes southern live oaks. On Florida's east coast, where it is now considered a resident, it is listed as threatened. In Florida, caracaras may also fall prey to invasive large snakes, such as Burmese pythons and boa constrictors.

Stray birds turn up far outside the normal range. Rare sightings have come from Minnesota, Michigan's Upper Peninsula, Vermont and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, Ontario, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island.

Crested caracara vs eagle

The crested caracara is sometimes called the Mexican eagle, but it is a falcon, not a true eagle. The nickname comes from a 1960 proposal that the bird perched on a prickly pear in the Aztec founding legend of Tenochtitlan was a caracara rather than a golden eagle. Mexico's national emblem still shows the golden eagle.

Conservation status

The crested caracara is listed as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List, assessed by BirdLife International in 2016. Across most of its range it is common to very common.

It is even likely to benefit from widespread deforestation in tropical South America, since it favors open country and avoids dense humid forest. The main exception is Florida, where the relict population is listed as threatened.