Sex and age differences in the diet of the Eurasian Sparrowhawk (Accipiter nisus) using web‐sourced photographs: exploring the feasibility of a new citizen science approach

• DOI: 10.1111/ibi.12918
• Publication Date: 2021-01-07T19:24:27Z
• Authors: Connor T. Panter; Arjun Amar
• Keywords: Accipiter; Sturnus; Sexual dimorphism; Nest box

Diet differences between the sexes and ages have often been recorded for bird species. Many raptor species show extreme sexual size dimorphism, with females considerably larger than males these may be reflected in their diets. studies raptors most frequently focus on analysing prey remains or pellets collected at nest‐sites. These methods are subsequently limited to breeding birds season also restricted by inability distinguish items sexes. The use of web‐sourced photographs examine diet has potential overcome some limitations more traditional used assess diet. We this approach Eurasian Sparrowhawk Accipiter nisus United Kingdom, exploring throughout entire year. In total, we obtained 843 Sparrowhawks items. There were 12 key that had a frequency ≥ 10 diet: Common Wood Pigeon Columba palumbus , Starling Sturnus vulgaris Collared Dove Streptopelia decaocto Rock livia Blackbird Turdus merula House Sparrow Passer domesticus unidentified ‘small’ ‘medium’ birds, European Goldfinch Carduelis carduelis, Greenfinch Chloris chloris Blue Tit Cyanistes caeruleus Stock oenas . Several seen one sex age group. Overall, average weights adult two half times heavier juvenile females. However, method slightly biased towards items, which should considered future studies. Despite limitation, our enabled dietary highly dimorphic explored