Falcons in Morocco ’s Essaouira archipelago have been observed " incarcerate " other birds and holding them for several mean solar day before feeding them to their young .
The unusual behaviour was observed by Abdeljebbar Qninba from Mohammed V University in Rabat , Morocco , while conducting a nosecount of falcons on the island of Mogador in 2014 , and report in the late variant of the journalAlauda . Among the species residing on the island isEleonora ’s falcon(Falco eleonorae ) , which normally eat only insects but has been know tofeed on other migrant birdssuch as the vernacular greater whitethroat , the Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree pipit and others during the breeding season .
For this reasonableness , Eleanora ’s falcon colonies tend to synchronize their chick - rearing with the height of the yearly migration , so as to ensure that prey is at a level best when their untried hatch .
Typically , this dietary electrical switch from insects to other chick occurs a few mean solar day prior to laying their first eggs in later summertime , as the falcons start catching quarry in anticipation for the arriver of a few redundant oral cavity to course . However , by kill their food so early on they take a chance it dry out or waste before it can be feed .
To get around this , the bird were determine continue their target alive for varying periods , thereby ensure its freshness when it come time to feed it to the chick . This was achieved using a number of clever tactics , such as stuffing small bird into pocket-size crevices , ensuring they were tightly stick in and unable to escape . to boot , Qninba remark that other small migratory birds were ground in hole and chap with their flight of steps and empennage feathers removed – presumptively by the falcon . Birds bank on thefeathersthat line their flank in ordering to be able to take escape , while the tail assembly feathers act as a variety of rudder that enables them to navigate . Without these , they are incapable of flying , and could therefore not escape from the cavities into which the falcon had drop them .
While the variety in diet occurs before the eggs are even place , Qninba and his colleagues suggest that the tactic of imprisoning razz may commence in the day leading up to the hatching of these eggs , to see to it a ready supplying of food that is just the correct freshness when the chicks require their first feed .
