Strange accident involving a northern goshawk (Accipiter gentilis)

Abstract

On 8 July 1970, I found the dried-up carcass of a male goshawk hanging in the Sarzbüttler Forest under a rotten hollow in the branchless trunk of an aspen tree, about 5 m high. A closer examination revealed the following: The opening of the hollow was oval in shape (8 cm wide, 12 cm high). Its lower edge was not closed, but ran down the trunk for about 20 cm in a gap just under 1 cm wide that had not yet been covered by bark. The goshawk was hanging at the end of this gap, with one leg trapped above the intertarsal joint. It was no longer possible to determine who the actual inhabitants of the hollow had been.

The findings described show that, like the tawny owl, the hawk apparently also preys on cave-dwelling birds or small mammals in the cave, and also gave me a clue as to why a hawk brood that had begun in April 700 m from the site of the accident may have been abandoned shortly afterwards.