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Great Grey Shrike

Great Grey Shrike

Lanius excubitor

Identify the Great Grey Shrike by sound or photo and log your sightings with Birdpass.

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The Great Grey Shrike is a large, predatory songbird with pale grey upperparts, a bold black mask and white underparts. It breeds across northern Europe and Asia, and many northern birds move south in winter. A perch-hunting carnivore, it feeds largely on voles and other small mammals and is known for storing prey by impaling it on thorns. It behaves like a tiny raptor.

Did you know?

  • Its scientific name, Lanius excubitor, means “sentinel butcher”.
  • Despite being a songbird, it regularly catches voles and small birds.

Voice

Call

About the species

Identification

A pale grey shrike with a black mask through the eye, black wings with white patches and a long black tail with white sides; the bill is strong and hooked. It is clearly larger and greyer than Red-backed Shrike, whose back is warm brown, and lacks the black forehead of the Lesser Grey Shrike.

Family

Laniidae

Size

Medium (thrush)

Colours

grey, white, black

About the habitat

Open country with scattered trees or bushes – bogs, clear-cuts, forest edges, farmland with hedgerows, heath and shrubby tundra – with prominent lookout perches.

Diet

Mainly small mammals, especially voles, as well as small birds, large insects, reptiles and amphibians; surplus prey is impaled on thorns or wire.

Behaviour

Hunts from exposed perches such as treetops, posts and wires, scanning and then dropping or darting out to seize prey; it may also hover briefly. Usually solitary and territorial, even in winter. It flies low and undulating between perches, swooping up to land.

Sources

Photo: Tisha Mukherjee, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Great Grey Shrike in Bhigwan August 2025 by Tisha Mukherjee 02.jpg

Sound: Pascal Christe, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lanius_excubitor_-_Great_Grey_Shrike_XC595816.mp3

Text: Wikipedia (English) + FinBIF species descriptions, CC BY-SA 4.0; FinBIF: CC BY 4.0 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_grey_shrike

See also