Updated: September 14, 2025. I just got back from a trip to Uganda in July 2025 and I'm updating my goshawk posts. I originally did a post on this bird, dated July 21, 2014, and referred to it as a pale chanting goshawk.
On iNaturalist three reviewers disagreed and indicated it was an eastern chanting goshawk. Somehow I conflated the terms and referred to it in my post as an eastern pale chanting goshawk which was incorrect, although Wikipedia included an aka as eastern (pale) chanting goshawk because for awhile it was considered as subspecies of the pale chanting goshawk and was then named as a separate species.
In Buffalo Springs National Reserve in Kenya we encountered an eastern chanting goshawk standing in the top of a thorny acacia tree, identified for us by Stephen, our guide and land cruiser driver. I have heard the term goshawk since a youth and have always thought of it as an exotic raptor, one that I had never previously encountered. Now, there before us, was a pretty ordinary looking raptor with this exotic name. What is a goshawk and how is a goshawk different from some other kind of hawk?
It turns out that there are about 18 species of goshawk and they are grouped in the genus Accipiter with about 19 species of sparrowhawk, as well as some other raptors such as the sharp-shinned hawk and Cooper's hawk, birds I am familiar with. These raptors are slender with short broad rounded wings and a long tail, long legs and long sharp talons and a sharp hooked bill. They are distinguished by the lack of a procoracoid foramen, which has something to do with the shoulder assembly. Enough of that.
 |
Eastern chanting goshawk in Buffalo Springs NR. Photo by Judy. |
The eastern chanting goshawk is also known as the Somali chanting goshawk. As I get more familiar with the African animals, I am struck by how many are identified by the term "Somali." I don't think I've run into any animals known as "Ethiopian" or "Kenyan" or "Tanzanian" or "Ugandan," etc. But several "Somali." This goshawk is found in southern Ethiopia, Djibouti, western Somalia, eastern Kenya, northeastern Tanzania and Uganda. It has a gray head, neck, breast and upperparts, except for white or lightly barred uppertail coverts. The belly has narrow gray and white bars. The upper portion of the bill (the cere) is yellow, the legs are orange/red and the eyes are dark brown.
 |
Illustration of eastern chanting goshawk from Birds of the World. |
 |
Range of eastern chanting goshawk from Birds of the World. |