Endangered
Madagascar Serpent Eagle
Eutriorchis astur
Madagascar Serpent Eagle is a bird in the family Accipitridae (order Accipitriformes) — Eutriorchis astur, recorded as Endangered.
Appearance
It is dark grey on its back and a lighter grey on its belly, breast, and throat. It has yellow eyes and a sharp, hooked beak with strong talons.
It measures 57 to 66 cm (22 to 26 in) long with a wingspan of 90 to 110 cm (35 to 43 in).
Range and habitat
This bird inhabits dense, humid, and broadleafed evergreen forests in northeastern and east-central Madagascar. It is endemic to Madagascar. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Diet
This serpent-eagle is diurnal. It eats lemurs both large and small, snakes, lizards, and frogs, that it hunts from high perches, swooping down from its perch and grasping its prey in its talons when it spots it.
In crisis
It is threatened by habitat loss. This species was believed to be extinct, with the last confirmed sighting being from 1930. The Madagascar serpent eagle is listed as an endangered species on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List, with an estimated population from one source of 533 adults.
As of 2025, the IUCN estimates a total population of 1,000 – 2,150 mature individuals. This species is threatened by the destruction of its specialized habitat and a presumed low rate of reproduction.
CITES lists this taxon on Appendix II. Confirm the current appendix on the CITES checklist.
Madagascar Serpent Eagle is Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Madagascar Serpent Eagle, Wikidata item Q934902. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
