Mauritius Kestrel Falco punctatus (Temminck 1823; mangeur de poules (mañzer d'pul)

Introduction

The Mauritius Kestrel was a little-known falcon until the current series of studies on its biology was started in January 1973 by Dr S. A. Temple (Temple 1977a, McKelvey 1977c, 1978, Jones 1980d, Jones et al. 1981, Jones & Owadally 1982b). I have drawn widely upon the unpublished manuscript of Temple (1978c) and have endeavoured to bring it up to date in the light of recent research. (Some of the following material also appears in Jones & Owadally (1985) (Ed.).)

Taxonomy

Brown & Amadon (1968) placed the Mauritius Kestrel in a super-species with the European Kestrel F. tinnunculus, Moluccan Kestrel F. moluccensis, Australian Kestrel F. cenchroides, Madagascar Kestrel F. newtoni, Seychelles Kestrel F. araea, and perhaps the American Kestrel F. sparverius. They also regarded the Lesser Kestrel F. naumanni, Greater Kestrel F. rupicoloides and the Fox Kestrel F. alopex as being typical kestrels. Fox (1977) kept the above grouping but gave them sub-generic status. Cade (1982) kept the sub-genus, calling it tinnunculus, but considered F. rupicoloides and F. alopex to have diverged earlier from the rest of the group.

Sub-generic status for the typical kestrels is more desirable than placing them in a single super-species. Within Brown & Amadon's super-species, F. punctatus and F. araea are too divergent to justify such a close grouping. It would, however, be reasonable to place the kestrels which appear to be of recent radiation from F. tinnunculus, or a common ancestor, in a single super-species. These would be the allopatric F. tinnunculus, F. sparverius, F. newtoni, F. cenchroides and F. moluccensis.