Sooty Falcon

The adult Sooty Falcon is a small to medium-sized falcon, with an all-gray plumage and a slim silhouette caused by its long and pointed wings and long tail. In direct sunlight, which is often the case in its breeding areas, the body appears light gray and bluish, somewhat similar to the African Tached Falcon. It is only up close that the darker centers of the gray feathers of the body and wing coverts become visible. In bad light, it looks darker and could be confused with other falcons. Remiges and rectrices are blackish and solid, creating a strong contrast with the gray body. A good identifying criterion for the adults in flight is the shape of the tail: the central rectrices are slightly longer than the others. The eye ring, the bare skin around the eye, the waxy color of the beak and the legs are yellow-lemon. The eye is dark. The beak is blue-gray with a dark tip.
The juvenile has a very different aspect and resembles a young Peregrine. It is ash-gray on top with russet edgings on the cover feather. The underside is whitish-russet, largely spotted with dark gray. This aspect comes from the bicolored character of each tectrix, gray in the center and largely edged with russet. The head is hooded with blackish, with wide mustaches reminiscent of the Peregrine. The hood contrasts with the creamy-russet throat, the lower cheeks, and the sides of the neck. Remiges and rectrices are barred with light. The bare parts are very pale yellow-green. Finally, its silhouette is less thin than the one of the adult.
The adult Sooty Falcon can be confused with other gray falcons, for example the already mentioned African Tached Falcon. However, the latter is smaller, more massive in appearance, of a more uniform gray and with identical rectrices.The Sooty Falcon of Eleonora's Moth is slightly larger and much darker, with a sooty-blackish-gray. It frequents the same wintering grounds. The male adult Kobez Falcon is a bluish-slate-gray and shows an inverse contrast to the Sooty Falcon, with remiges and rectrices appearing paler than the rest of the bird. Furthermore, its bare parts are a bright orange. The juvenile Sooty Falcon is more delicate to distinguish from that of other species and should take note of the criteria mentioned above. The species most closely resembling it is the young Love Falcon.