5 Fascinating Facts About the Secretary Bird (Sagitarius Serpentarius)

By Mike Unwin

This is one of Africa’s weirdest birds. It struts about the savannah with the head of an eagle and the legs of a stork. In reality, it is a bird of prey – with a family all to itself. The Secretary bird possesses a snake-killing prowess that is the stuff of legend. Here are a few interesting tidbits about the African Secretary bird.

The secretary bird appears on the coat-of-arms of two nations: Sudan and South Africa.
Snakes form only a small part of the secretary bird’s diet, which also includes insects, small mammals, birds’ eggs, crabs and other reptiles.
Secretary birds use the thickened soles of their feet to stamp on their prey, stunning it and then swallowing it whole.
Studies of the secretary bird’s feeding technique helped scientists to shed light on the hunting strategies of the prehistoric ‘terror birds’. These were giant flightless predators that roamed the planet over 3 million years ago.
There are different theories about the origins of the secretary bird’s name. One holds that the feathers behind the bird’s head reminded 19th-century Europeans of the quill pens that secretaries tucked behind their ears. It is more likely, however, that the name derives from the Arabic saqr-et-tair or ‘hunter bird’.