Diet of the White-Tailed Eagle During the Breeding Season in the Polesski State Radiation-Ecological Reserve, Belarus

Abstract

This article presents data on the diet of the White-Tailed Eagle (Haliaeetus albicilla) collected during breeding seasons of 2006–2015 in the Polesski State Radiation-Ecological Reserve. The data included 127 records of prey remains belonging to 27 species of vertebrates collected in and under the nests. We discovered that the diet of the White-Tailed Eagle mainly consists of vertebrates of three classes: fishes (Pisces) 48.1 %, birds (Aves) 41.7 % and mammals (Mammalia) 10.2 %. At the present, the main prey species in the diet of the White-Tailed Eagle in the breeding season are: Bream (Abramis brama) – 22.0 %, Black Stork (Ciconia nigra) – 12.6 %, Northern Pike (Esox lucius) – 10.2 %, Wild Boar (Sus scrofa) – 7.1 %, White Stork (Ciconia ciconia) – 6.3 %, Mallard (Anas platyrhynchos) – 5.5 % and Eurasian Coot (Fulica atra) – 5.5 %. Together these species makes up 69.2 % or 2/3 of the diet of this raptor. We also established that cannibalism is a character feature of the local population of White-Tailed Eagle, and its proportion is 2.4 %.