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Prairie Falcon

Falco mexicanusOrder: FALCONIFORMESFamily: Falcons (Falconidae)

Prairie Falcon Portrait
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General

Prairie Falcon: Medium-sized falcon with brown upperparts, dark-spotted pale underparts, and dark brown moustache stripe. Dark underwing-bars are visible in flight. Sexes are similar.

Range and Habitat

Prairie Falcon: Breeds from British Columbia and the Canadian prairie provinces south to Mexico and northern Texas. Spends winters in breeding range and sparingly farther east. Preferred habitats include barren mountains, dry plains, and prairies.

Listen to Call

Voice Text

"kree-kree-kree"

Interesting Facts

  • The Prairie Falcon was first described in 1850 by Hermann Schlegel, the German ornithologist.
  • It often shares its nesting cliff with Common Ravens, Golden Eagles, and Red-tailed Hawks.
  • They sometimes bathe in river shallows, but dust-bathing is probably more common than water-bathing, because of the general scarcity of standing water in its habitat.
  • A group of falcons has many collective nouns, including a "bazaar", "eyrie", "ringing up", "stooping up", and "tower" of falcons.


Author

Gary Owen Dick

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Range Map for Prairie Falcon
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Bird Call Credits: The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Martyn Stewart, http://www.naturesound.org, Redmond, Washington USA. The reuse or copying of bird calls in this database is strictly forbidden.
Family
Species Falco mexicanus
Length15 - 19 Inches
Wingspan41 Inches

Prairie Falcon

Prairie Falcon: Medium falcon with brown upperparts, dark-spotted pale underparts, dark brown moustache stripe. Dark underwing-bars visible in flight. Feeds on small birds and mammals, and large insects. Swift flight with rapid wing beats. Sometimes alternates several rapid wing beats with a glide.

● Song: "kree-kree-kree"

● Foraging & Feeding: Prairie Falcon: Diet consists mainly of birds, which it pursues on the wing but usually captures on or near the ground. Also feeds on small mammals such as prairie dogs and young rabbits.

● Breeding & nesting: Prairie Falcon: Four to five white eggs, heavily marked with brown and purple, are laid in a scrape of loose dirt on a cliff ledge, cave, or crevice, or sometimes in an abandoned nest of another species. Incubation ranges from 29 to 31 days and is carried out mainly by the female.

● Similar species: Prairie Falcon: Merlin is much smaller, has a less distinct moustache stripe, more strongly barred tail, and lacks distinctive black mark on underwings. Peregrine Falcon lacks pale stripe behind eye, has thicker moustache stripe, wings that reach tail tip at rest, and lacks black underwing patches.

Flight Pattern

Swift direct flight with rapid wing beats.
Prairie Falcon Body Illustration
● Range & Habitat: Prairie Falcon: Breeds from British Columbia and the Canadian prairie provinces south to Mexico and northern Texas. Spends winters in breeding range and sparingly farther east. Preferred habitats include barren mountains, dry plains, and prairies.
BreedingMonogamous, Solitary nester
PopulationUncommon to fairly common
MigrationNonmigratory
Weight19.2 Ounces