Secretarybird | Sagittariidae

Secretarisvogels | Secretarios

A single species, the only living member of this family, without close relatives and standing entirely isolated within the order of birds of prey. The bill, cere and large eyes are those of a raptor, but the rest of the build is not: the bird stands on bare walking legs armoured with large scales, to well over a metre in height, and the toes are short and blunt with short, barely curved claws — a foot for striking, not for grasping. Food is sought on foot, in daily marches of tens of kilometres across grassland and open savanna, flushing grasshoppers, lizards, rodents and snakes and killing them against the ground with a very fast, powerful kick; small prey is swallowed whole. The head carries a bare orange-red mask and a crest of long, black-tipped nape feathers that is raised in excitement. The wings are long and broad with black flight feathers and the two central tail feathers project far beyond the rest; for all its walking legs the bird soars readily and at length. The nest is a broad platform of sticks on top of a flat-crowned thorn tree, used year after year.