noisy aerial displays, including outside the breeding season. However the aerial display of the pair on territory tends to be much less dramatic than that of the augur buzzard, usually confined to circling or gentle stooping. The breeding season peaks in July to December, but can range from as early as from May to as late as March. The large stick nest is built in a tree or on a crag, and is often reused and enlarged in subsequent seasons. At first construction the nest with average about across and deep but easily can exceed in diameter with repeated uses. Two creamy or bluish white eggs (or very rarely three) are laid at about three day intervals and incubated by the female only, although food is brought to her on the nest by the male. A surveys of egg sizes show they average with a range in height of and in diameter of . The eggs hatch in about 40 days, after a further 56–60 days they can attempt flight. The parents will attack intruders, including humans, who come too close to the nest. Siblicide has been widely reported but, presumably when food supply is ample, nests often produce two fledglings. At 70 days they become independent of the nest, but young birds may then be seen with the adult pair for some time. As in other tropical raptors compared to temperate-zone relatives, the breeding cycle is relatively elongated and clutch size relatively small in the jackal buzzard compared to temperate-zone Buteo species. Dietary habits The diet of the jackal buzzard is led mainly by small ground mammals, especially rodents. Other prey may include snakes, lizards, ground-feeding birds such as sandgrouse and gamebirds (or alternately the nestlings and fledglings of other birds), insects, and road-kills. Typically, this raptor still-hunts by dropping on its prey from a perch, often either trees or roadside poles or posts. It takes its prey almost exclusively on bare ground, including roads. It also may hunt by soaring or periodically hovering or hanging on updrafts. A study from Grahamstown, South Africa found the prey around nest to consist of assorted rat species (21 items), four-striped grass mouse (8 items) and two golden moles. On evidence, the jackal buzzard mainly takes small mammals during the nesting cycle and then switches to a largely carrion-based diet during the non-breeding season. Jackal buzzards have been recorded at various carrion,