English: Pallid Harrier, Pale Harrier
Russian: Степный лунь
German: Steppenweihe
French: Busard pale
Mongolian: Хээрийн хулд, Хээрийн цагаан элэгт
Japanese: ウスハイイロチュウヒ(Usuhaiiro-chuhi)

Body Length: 40-50 cm
Wing span: 97-118 cm

Habitat: Summer visitor, winters in Africa. Very rare but almost annual vagrant to Britain. Habitat, food and nest much as for Montagu’s Harrier.

Identification: Shape similar to Montagu’s Harrier, but adult ♀ differs on average in having slightly broader wing-base and shorter and more ample ‘hand’, thus is a trifle more compact and buzzard-like, and ♂ has shorter ‘hand’. Hunting flight of narrow-winged ♂often with quick Kestrel-like wingbeats, different from Montagu’s. Reliable identification, however, can be made only by using plumage characters, too. Adult ♂: Very pale; pearl-grey above (without prominent white uppertail-coverts of Hen Harrier), white below with only faintly darker head and upper breast, wing-tips with narrow black wdges.

• Adult ♀: Very similar to ♀ Montagu’s but told by; almost uniformly dark brown secondaries above, lacking a blackish band (but can have a hint); overall darker secodaries below with denser dark bands, and pale bands darkening towards body; training edge of ‘hand’ paler, and barring of primaries less strong distally; larger underwing-coverts and axillaries dark, only finely spotted pale, ‘armpits’ same or diffusely barred rufous. Told from very similar ♀ Hen by different wing shape.
  
• Juvenile: Very similar to juvenile Montagu’s but separated by prominent, unspotted pale buff-white neck-collar, enhanced by uniform dark drown sides of neck (‘boa’). Primary bases below often unbarred, leaving pale ‘boomerang’ outside dark tips of coverts. 1st summer: Usually like juvenile (but paler and worn), though a few ♂♂ moult early and show pale belly, a few thin rufous streaks on breast, and greyish central tail-feathers even in Mar.