The most powerful eagle ever !

[EagleMan]

and this, my friends, is Haast's eagle. a.k. a. Harpagostris moorei
it lived in New Zeeland, and sadly dissapeared some 2000 years ago. it was huge, a little large and flight would be impossible for him, it reached 15 kilo for a big female, and was a moa hunter, can you imagine ? a moa was the largest bird ever, as much as 3 meter tall and 200 kilo! and this eagle hunt moa for food, in fact was a moa specialist, sadly after maori arrival , the man hunt moa till extinction, so the eagle was next.

[Palmer]

I watched a program on these once i think. They started killing people because the people killed off nearly all of ther prey!:!:

[EagleMan]

the Haast eagle seems to be an hawk eaglenot an harpy relative, recent dna studies show that this giant eagle was a relative of australian little eagle wich belong to hawk eagle subfamily, the scientists were expected to be related at least with wedge tailed eagle, an aquila type.
the australian little eagle is very closed to booted eahle and both are hawk eagle type birds,
much interesting the haast eagle seems to preyed on humans:supz: :supz: :supz: at least ancient cave paintings from new zeeland show that.
it was an awesome bird complete fossilized skeleton present talons 3 time larges than harpy's , the flight silhouette was much like crowned with short wings and long tail,
try to imsgine how it will be to hunt with this eagle. sadly it's extincted

[EagleInYarak]

are u tellin me that the te-hekoi(haast eagle)which btw is my fav extinct animal has talons that are 15 inches, because i think that u mean the regular talons not the halluxes, and still love harpies better

[EagleInYarak]

on BBC website i saw at least 2 years ago it should 2 pics of harpies and said that they were haasts

[EagleInYarak]

heres the link http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/wildfacts/factfiles/3044.shtml

[EagleInYarak]

its grip force must have been so tremendous that it cant b used in falconry, imagine it killed a 600+lb bird by crushing the thickest part of its body, not going for the neck at times!reminds me of the harpy,crowned,goldie,martial,and eurasian eagle owl, bone chillin stuff