A scraak is a flightless bird which typically nests in the upper branches of bachanda trees. It hunts by waiting quietly in the upper branches of the tree for small mammals or other prey to appear on lower branches. The scraak then leaps down upon the prey, frightening it into immobility with a fearsome screech. Scraaks still retain (from an earlier stage of their evolution) a prehensile tail. They use the tail and their razor-sharp claws to climb to the higher branches of a tree.