Madagascar sparrowhawk (1 Viewer)

[John Cantelo]

Attaching two shots I took at Berenty in November 2012- one is a I believe a female or maybe imm. Frances's Sparrowhawk, but the other is more puzzling, it might be a juv Frances's perhaps but it was greyish above, had no pale marks on the head and looked to be adult basically. No mesial stripe, the throat looked pale. It had quite thick broad dark tail bars on the upper surface- no sure if this has any specific i. d. value though. It basically reminded me of a small version of Henst's Goshawk. I'd value opinions on its identity as there is so much confusion between these two. This was my third trip and this was the first time I had encountered even a possible Madagascar Sparrowhawk, so as Pete Morris says it's clearly rare and often misidentified.
Thanks

And we in Europe still worry over Goshawk vs female Sparrowhawk! Nice photos, Phil, whatever they are!