Six of the eight birds recorded in western Saudi Arabia were adults, 
whilst details on age of the records prior to 1987 are generally lacking. 
The field identification of adult Pallas's Fish Eagles is straightforward, in 
contrast to that of juvenile and immature birds, which can be confused 
easily with young Aquila eagles, in particular Tawny Eagle A. rapax and 
Imperial Eagle A. heliaca. Therefore the presence of juvenile/immature 
Pallas's Fish Eagles might easily be overlooked, especially in southwestern 
Saudi Arabia where the two Aquila spp. are more common throughout 
the winter (pers. obs.). 
All records of Pallas's Fish Eagles in Arabia are from mid-October to the 
end of March. Autumn dispersal in the northern breeding areas of the 
former U.S.S.R. (e.g. Kazakhstan) begins in October. Breeding in these 
areas starts from March onwards, but northward movements from 
presumed immature birds continue throughout April until May 
(Dementiev & Gladkov 1951; Cramp & Simmons 1980). In India breeding 
takes place from October to February after which many birds disappear 
from the lower breeding areas during the hotter months (June-July), 
possibly migrating northwards to reach the high plateaus of western 
Tibet (Ali & Ripley 1983). The records from Arabia fit very well into the 
migration pattern of the northern breeding populations, but not into the 
pattern of the breeding birds from India. 
References 
ALI, S. AND RIPLEY, S. D. (1983) Handbook to the Birds of India and Pakistan. 
Compact edition. Oxford University Press. 
ALLOUSE, B. E. (1953) The Avifauna of Iraq. Iraq Natural History Socieiy, 
Baghdad. 
BROOKS, D. J., EVANS, M. I., MARTINS, R. P. AND PORTER, R.F. (1987) 
The status of birds in North Yemen and the records of the OSME expedition in 
autumn 1985. Sandgrouse 9: 4-66. 
BROWN, L.H., URBAN, EK. AND NEWMAN, K. (1982) The Birds of Africa. 
Vol. I. Academic Press, London. 
BUNDY, G., CONNOR, R. J. AND HARRISON, C. J. O. (1989) Birds of the 
Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. Whiterby, London. 
COLLAR, N.J. AND ANDREW, P. (1988) Birds to Watch: the ICBP World Check- 
list of Threatened Birds. ICBP, Cambridge. 
CRAMP, S. AND SIMMONS, K. E. L. (eds) (1980) The Birds of the Western 
Palearctic. Vol. 11. Oxford University Press. 
DEMENTIEV, G. P. ANDGLADKOV,N. A. (1951) The Birds of the Soviet Union. 
English edition, Jerusalem 1966; 1st progr. Sci. Transl. 
5 
