A lovely juvenile bird of prey...

...and as we stayed on an apple farm nearby, I knew where to look for it.

But I did not expect to find a treasure like this.

We stayed on the farm in a cottage for 6 months when we arrived in the area, as a lady invited us to leave a big city, in order for us to manage a step-down clinic for cancer survivors, that she was of the mind to build the clinic on her farm. Sadly, nothing came of it, as the lady died, and we had to find another place to stay. It's a long story with many incidents, but safe to say that we survived.
Now to get back to the juvenile bird. it is a Buzzard and I have some lovely shots of it to share with you.

A juvenile Jackal Buzzard (Buteo rufofuscus). And the reason why they are called Jackal Buzzards is that the sound that they make is similar to the call of the Black-backed Jackal.

The Jackal Buzzards are endemic to South Africa, and they mostly occur in hilly and mountainous terrain. They are also mostly sedentary and solitary. The Buzzards can also hover in flight, or hang motionless on updrafts along ridges of hills, and they mostly eat small mammals and reptiles.

The fluffing action normally means that they are preparing for flight, as I will show you below.

Oh yes, you can see it was ready for takeoff.

Drat! I missed the takeoff, but followed it with the zoom.

It flew across a neighboring farm and turned to land in a big tree at the roadside.

I was right, as it sat in the tree watching for a feeding opportunity.

I took the photos of the buzzard at a roadside farmstall that we stopped at to have a short meeting with the principal of a school, that approached Papillon for support. When we lived on the farm here Papillon placed 20 computers at the school for the children to be taught basic PC Literacy. Much time has gone past since then, and as we were on our way to the coastal town of Hermanus, the road passed right through the apple valley where the school is situated. The upshot of the meeting was that we asked the principal to send us a needs list.

We are also currently busy with support to another center for disabled children, and it seems that destiny continues to want us to focus on children and education. I have to say that in the many years of Papillon's history our focus was mainly on adult education, but children also featured occasionally in our projects. Now, we are being steered solidly into support for the children. We don't believe in handouts and the projects that we design have to have controlled impact results. As I have said before, many NPO's, charities, and good causes are shutting down due to a lack of funding, but we have survived it before, and we will continue to do so as we are working on a minimalist basis.

Information about the Jackal Buzzards, taken from our book: "Sasol Birds of Southern Africa". ISBN 978-1-77584-668-0

I hope you enjoyed the pictures and the story.

Photos by Zac Smith. All-Rights-Reserved.

Camera: Canon PowershotSX70HS Bridge camera.

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