Wildlife Spotting

There's also an "Identifying Animals Through Osteology" mission this pelvis would be right at home in

Thank you so much for the new pictures! You're definitely right about it being a merlin, falcons have much thicker pelvises in shape than accipitriformes, which tend to be a bit curvier than this. The last picture was also extremely helpful, the vertebra arrangement is a much better match for falcons than hawks. The merlin pelvis in the link I gave measures at right about 3.5 cm from the ventral (top) veiw and 4 cm from the lateral (side) veiw, which seems to be a fit your pelvis. Merlins also seem to have a bit curvier of an ischial angle than other falcons like the kestrel, so that's one thing that threw me off but confirms it's a merlin. Really neat find you have, it's such a beautiful little bone.

Nice finding, Ernle. By the way, I moved your spotting from Mammals to Birds. You can also add it to the "Signs of wildlife" mission.

The ischial angle (The very back of the pelvis after the holes, resting on your finger in the first photo) turns slightly down as seen in accipitriformes, and the vertebra match accipitriformes better than falcon. I'm leaning on male sparrowhawk, but need more references pic. And if you still have it and could upload more images, perhaps some taken from above of the top, bottom and side, it would be very helpful. Even better if you could have an exact measurement with a ruler

Bird pelvis, perhaps of a falcon: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jrochester/16206540581/in/gallery-66337245@N00-72157678747666368/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/jrochester/16206513101/in/gallery-66337245@N00-72157678747666368/ Or accipitriform: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jrochester/16225201055/in/gallery-66337245@N00-72157678747666368/

Hello Ernle and Welcome to the Project Noah community! We hope you like the website as much as we do. There are many aspects to the site and community. The best way to get started is to read the FAQs at http://www.projectnoah.org/faq where you can find all the tips, advice and "rules" of Project Noah. You, like the rest of the community, will be able to suggest IDs for species that you know (but that have not been identified), and make useful or encouraging comments on other users' spottings (and they on yours). There are also "missions" you can join and add spottings to. See http://www.projectnoah.org/missions . A mission you should join is the https://www.projectnoah.org/missions/2194946003 to chose the "best wildlife photo of 2019",only the spottings added to that mission are eligible.Note that most missions are "local". Be sure not to add a spotting to a mission that was outside of mission boundaries or theme :) Each mission has a map you may consult showing its range. We also maintain a blog archive http://blog.projectnoah.org/ where we have posted previous articles from specialists from different geographical areas and categories of spottings, as well as wildlife "adventures". So enjoy yourself, share, communicate, learn. See you around :)