Barred Hawk

Morphnarchus princeps hunts mostly in the canopy and along mountain forests. The hunting technique of barred hawks contains both active and inactive activities. The hawks can be seen silently sitting on a branch looking for prey or habitually soaring noisily in the sky in a group of two or more. Barred hawks rarely leave the forest region to hunt but may hunt along the edges. They swiftly and quietly fly from branch to branch, when hunting within the forest. When perching they are usually at a mid to low height off the ground and are often on the hunt for slow prey such as frogs, snakes, small mammals and birds, and large insects. Of 104 prey items brought to a nest in Ecuador, 48% consisted of La Bonita caecilians and 35% were various snakes. Further study supports the significance of caecilians, largely subterranean and worm-like but potentially large (exceeding 62 cm (24 in) when taken) amphibians, in this species' diet, especially when recent rainfall appears to draw the prey to the surface of the ground.

This species of hawk has a large Extent of Occurrence of 350,000 km. The barred hawks is primarily a Caribbean species of the middle altitudes, and are found in Costa Rica, Peru, and Panama and on both sides of the Andes in northern Ecuador and western Columbia. Subtropical or tropical lowland and mountain forests are the natural habitat of the barred hawk. They live between 300 and 2,500 m (980 and 8,200 ft) in elevation and are most abundant in the 900 to 1,600 m (3,000 to 5,200 ft) elevation range.