Crested honey buzzard Pernis ptilorhynchus

The crested honey buzzard (Pernis ptilorhynchus) is an Eastern Palearctic species with a wide distribution range throughout the Asian continent. The migratory sub-species within P. ptilorhynchus, P. p. orientalis, is mostly known from East and South Asia, but is increasingly recorded in Central Asia and the Middle East. The migration flyway in East Asia is relatively well documented through observational and remote-tracking studies of the Japanese population. Birds breeding in Southern Siberia, Southern and North-Eastern China, Japan, and Korea winter in India and Southeast Asia. A smaller number of birds follow a western migration flyway through Central Asia. These birds probably breed in the species' westernmost Siberian breeding grounds and migrate through Central Asia to winter in the Middle East. The species has also been recorded in the African-Eurasian flyway, where it is probably caught in flocks of migrating European honey buzzard P. apivorus and migrates with them to the African wintering grounds. These vagrant birds are sometimes thought to be hybrids, but no DNA analysis has confirmed this. This chapter presents a summary of the current knowledge of the migratory behaviour of the migratory sub-species of the crested honey buzzard in East Asia, with an overview of available information in its western distribution range and within the Western Palearctic. The information presented here is gathered from resources available in English, and is therefore not a complete synthesis of all the existing knowledge about the migration behaviour of the crested honey buzzard.