Black Kite in Suffolk

[Brian S]

There have been a run of records in Suffolk, UK, recently and these have produced a lot of discussion about where they came from, etc..

The excellent photos by Sean Nixon of one at Boyton shows a richly and contrastingly coloured bird, which has further lead to discussion of whether they are eastern or southern, or even hybrids with Red Kites. I will keep my opinion pretty much to myself, as I want to hear the thoughts of others, but to me, just back from seeing many in Spain, they look structurally like Black Kite and the plumage is matched by some (not many) I saw there.

Does anybody have any comments on this bird

Brian S

[Joe stockwell]

now, 2 days ago at rooksbury mill we had a bird almost identical in shape, size and flight pattern as a black kite but looking at plumage colouration i put it down to being a red kite wich was rather large, now i have seen theese photos i am not so sure, i remember seeing loads of black kites in the dordogne a couple of years ago and they were very dark but structually simalar to the bird i saw 2 days ago so i dont think this is the only light coloured bird in the uk at the moment all i know is i wish i had seen it earlier than i did

[Josh Jones]

Looks ok for a nice, bright Black Kite to me.

Discussion on another forum suggests it is the Lincolnshire bird (which is ludicrous, this bird hasn't been since last autumn), merely based on the fact it is a bright looking individual. These birds certainly do occur - what would be useful is a nice shot of the upperside to comment further!

Interestingly I see that a Black-eared Kite is knocking around in East Norfolk - presumably the bird lost from London Zoo - if so then perhaps all the recent records from the east coast will be thrown into doubt over origins... for some reason it was suggested that bird might even be the winter 06/07 Black-eared returning, which was rather odd.

[jamesg]

I don't see anything hybridish about the Suffolk bird. To my eye, the only really odd thing about it for BK is the discolouration on the face, iris and cere. I'm not sure what proportion of adult BK's would show so much white there, and totally lack yellow pigments in the bare parts. Am I right in thinking that the iris and cere can become more greyish in much older birds? Unfortunately I don't have Forsman to hand.

I'd hazard that this type of discolouration is common in captive birds... It's no coincidence that there are up to three Black Kites and one Black-eared Kite in East Anglia at the moment - and three Black and one Black eared just escaped from London Zoo...

Chances are one or two wild BK's will also arrive in the current overshoot conditions. Being sociable animals, they could easily join up with the burgeoning 'flock' at Horsey. It's the Cranes all over again!

[Colin Key]

Milvus migrans is a very common bird for me Brian, although admittedly 99% of the birds I see are in post-breeding plumage in the autumn passage at Cabo de São Vicente.

But, I do see birds at close quarters and in good light and have to admit that this individual is very odd; on the basis of tail shape photo #2 is clearly M. migrans, but as far as the other two shots are concerned, if I saw these in the field they would be "Red Kites" with rather odd tails. Forsman depicts a few individuals with exceptionally rufous underparts and pale heads, but it is something I have never seen.

Against the sun, in bright light these would be migrans, with the amount of detail and colour that these three shots show, Qué?

Colin

[JanJ]

The all black bill, the whitish yellow iris, pale head - the last would support an older Black kite. Grey hand and long p6 would confirm it. The structure looks somewhat different, with narrower wing - especially the hand, but with the broad, shorter tail and longer p6 of Black, compare to the Red Kite below - whick although looks slightly narrower-winged.

http://www.netfugl.dk/pictures.php?id=showpicture&picture_id=18921

http://www.netfugl.dk/pictures.php?id=showpicture&picture_id=16102

If a hybrid theory is a relevant suggestion I couldn´t say, but some Black are relatively difficult to identify as to ssp

JanJ

[mike meidlinger]

Hi guys,

I would just like to add a little bit more info with regards to what Jamesg has said about the escapes from London Zoo...according to them the three Black Kites that were lost came in from a private collection and were labelled as Cape Verde Kites but a DNA test showed that they were typical migrans...could the confusion have been caused by the birds being particularly rufous/rusty tinged, perhaps more than is typical???

Mike

[forktail]

Hi there

regarding numbers of Black Kite

a quick search on RBA and a perusal of the observation times makes for interesting reading...

a small population of BK out east would be a rather cool chump magnet

F.

[birdertrev]

Josh, the Lincolnshire bird was seen again on March 13th this year.

Trev

[butor2003]

There have been a run of records in Suffolk, UK, recently and these have produced a lot of discussion about where they came from, etc..

The excellent photos by Sean Nixon of one at Boyton shows a richly and contrastingly coloured bird, which has further lead to discussion of whether they are eastern or southern, or even hybrids with Red Kites. I will keep my opinion pretty much to myself, as I want to hear the thoughts of others, but to me, just back from seeing many in Spain, they look structurally like Black Kite and the plumage is matched by some (not many) I saw there.

Does anybody have any comments on this bird

Brian S

Well Black Kites are extremely common here around Lake Geneva but I must say that I have never seen one that was as reddish as shown in the photos. (Unless the photos have over emphasised the reddish shade). The shape looks right but the colour not. I would suspect a hybrid myself. Didn't I read that a Black Kite had bred with a Red Kite somewhere last year in the North of England???

Mike

[Josh Jones]

Josh, the Lincolnshire bird was seen again on March 13th this year.

Yes I heard about that report. Was it genuine then? Amazing no one else saw it before/after.

[Alex Lees]

Yes I heard about that report. Was it genuine then? Amazing no one else saw it before/after.

It was seen by Alan Ball (from the train), so yes I'd be pretty sure it was a Black Kite, but whether it was the Black(-eared) Kite is still open to question...

Just trying to get to the bottom of the rumours, but are these escaped kites the infamous 'Cape Verde kites' from the Johnson et al. (2005) study (appended below).

Alex

[birdertrev]

I don't think Black Eared was in the picture was it Alex ? surely the Digby bird seen by Alan was the Nocton bird as they are only about 5 miles apart.

Trev

[Alex Lees]

I don't think Black Eared was in the picture was it Alex ? surely the Digby bird seen by Alan was the Nocton bird as they are only about 5 miles apart.

Trev

Hi Trev

Most likely, just raising the spectre of that taxon given the current climate of Black Kites of unknown provenance, atypical winter occurence and subspecefic identity...

Any more news rumours about the London birds?

cheers

Alex

[Andrew Easton]

In 2002 five putative Cape Verde (Red) Kites Milvus milvus fasciicauda were captured and brought to the National Birds of Prey Centre in Gloucesterhire, with the intention of beginning a captive breeding programme, in collaboration with the Peregrine Fund, to try and prevent the increasing hybridisation with Black Kites from wiping out what some people considered potentially a full species. The Peregrine Fund notes that "once in the hand, the kites were found to share characteristics of both Red Kites and Black Kites with substantial variation between individuals. It was clear from plumage and morphological measurements that none of the kites captured could be reliably identified as either Cape Verde or Black Kites".

Mitochondrial DNA analysis subsequently confirmed them to be either Black Kites or hybrids with maternal Black Kite ancestry, but given the substantial individual variation and mixed species characteristics already noted all were clearly hybrids, and probably of varying generations as such hybrids are fertile and are known to have themselves then bred to produce further generations of hybrids.

The same study, published in The Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 2005 Prioritizing species conservation: does the Cape Verde kite exist? (http://journals.royalsociety.org/content/lql87q3nt9nufm1w/) carried out similar mtDNA analysis of the original specimens from which Cape Verde (Red) Kite was described which proved them to have a Red Kite ancestry and not to be sufficiently distinct to be elevated to species status. As such the breeding program was abandoned; a pair were kept at the National Birds of Prey Centre (though to date they have not bred) and in 2005 the remaining three birds, a male and two females, were donated to London Zoo as "Black" Kites.

Thanks are due to Keith Beavan, Director of the the National Birds of Prey Centre, for confirming the provenance of the London Zoo birds.

Proving the existence of escaped hybrid Cape Verde Kites in the UK was the relatively easy bit, working out which they are amongst the abundance of records of Black Kites in East Anglia will be somewhat trickier!

[andy22]

On the subject of all these black kites about, I managed to see one in the fakenham area (norfolk) today, i will never know if it was a wild bird or one of the escapes!

cheers andy

[Kit Day]

http://www.billbaston.com/Extremadura_2005-1.html

The top photo on this page looks quite similar to the Boyton bird?

[forktail]

see http://www.birdwatch.plus.com/kites.html

for photos of recent 'Black-eared' and Red kites from east norfolk

[Josh Jones]

On the subject of all these black kites about, I managed to see one in the fakenham area (norfolk) today, i will never know if it was a wild bird or one of the escapes!

That's interesting, none were reported in the county yesterday!

[Josh Jones]

see http://www.birdwatch.plus.com/kites.html

for photos of recent 'Black-eared' and Red kites from east norfolk

Umm, so why aren't both of those birds Red Kites? :puzzled:

[Harry Hussey]

I share Josh's misgivings about the 'Black-eared' Kite on the above link (note the use of inverted commas by Forktail), as, surely, a bird with well-streaked rufous underparts, obvious white at the primary bases underneath, no dark 'mask' (as all ages of Black-eared should have) etc is a Red: the tail is just heavily worn, so the lack of an obvious fork isn't necessarily a problem with this identification.

[Josh Jones]

I share Josh's misgivings about the 'Black-eared' Kite on the above link (note the use of inverted commas by Forktail), as, surely, a bird with well-streaked rufous underparts, obvious white at the primary bases underneath, no dark 'mask' (as all ages of Black-eared should have) etc is a Red: the tail is just heavily worn, so the lack of an obvious fork isn't necessarily a problem with this identification.

Glad someone's thinking what I'm thinking Harry! A bird like this was seen on my patch last week.

[forktail]

As well as the three Cape Verde Kites, a 'lineatus' also escaped. Several of those birds observed clearly appear to be these CV Kites. However, a bird with the 'mask' and other features of a lineatus has also been observed by a handful of people and I believe one observer has photographed it. Details were given at a recent Great Yarmouth Bird Club meeting. Don't quote me though, as I don't know the exact details.

[Ilya Maclean]

Umm, so why aren't both of those birds Red Kites? :puzzled:

I'd wondered much the same thing! Just to confuse things further however, here's a link to a photo of Kites at London Zoo taken prior to the escape incident:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/8773601@N03/2470407349/sizes/l/

Note the lack of mask. The photographer suggested they were of Black-eared Kites, but I wonder if they're actually of Cape Verde Kites and the Winterton bird is actually a Cape Verde Kite?? As confused as you are!

[Josh Jones]

Well they certainly look quite rufous in that pic! Perhaps you are right Ilya. Either way there is going to be some doubt over most/all Black Kite records for the forseeable future, especially when they are Cape Verde-style bright things like that (as the Boyton bird does)...

Who knows about the Winterton bird - it just looks very like a Red Kite with heavily worn tail. I am going to enquire with the local birder who has the Black-type worn Red Kite on my patch recently, he reportedly got record shots.

[forktail]

Before it gets complicated it might be worth pointing out that CV is intermediate in field characters between Black and Red but it is actually often classified as a sub-species of Red (not a hybrid) or split off as an endemic (and rarest raptor in the world). Pure birds only occur on one island in the east now. There are amazingly few birds known to exist: (4-6 in 96 and only two in 99!)

They've probably interbred with Black but this has been questioned (info from Ferguson Lees' Raptors) and competition has resulted in their retreat. In fact Black Kites are very, very scarce on the CV isles now too.

[chris butterworth]

Well Black Kites are extremely common here around Lake Geneva but I must say that I have never seen one that was as reddish as shown in the photos. (Unless the photos have over emphasised the reddish shade). The shape looks right but the colour not. I would suspect a hybrid myself. Didn't I read that a Black Kite had bred with a Red Kite somewhere last year in the North of England???

Mike

Spent a LOT of time checking Kites in the Cape Verdes in 2000 - mainly to try and ID the indiginous taxon, among plenty of Black Kite and 'putative' hybrids, and saw 3 Kites that looked similar to the bird shown. I'm not saying it is a Cape Verde bird but the possibility of it being a hybrid has to be taken into consideration:err:

[Ilya Maclean]

Well they certainly look quite rufous in that pic! Perhaps you are right Ilya. Either way there is going to be some doubt over most/all Black Kite records for the forseeable future, especially when they are Cape Verde-style bright things like that (as the Boyton bird does)...

Who knows about the Winterton bird - it just looks very like a Red Kite with heavily worn tail. I am going to enquire with the local birder who has the Black-type worn Red Kite on my patch recently, he reportedly got record shots.

I've been kindly provided with more photos of Kites in London Zoo. I'm going to propose some hypotheses:

The bird depicted in the top set of photos on the Winterton website here:

http://www.birdwatch.plus.com/kites.html

is the same bird, with a mangled tail as on the left of of the photograph here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/andrewmac/419519987/

Although London Zoo had the enclosure labelled as Black Kites, the birds are in fact Cape Verde (Red) Kites Milvus milvus fasciicauda and not Black Kites or Black-eared Kites.

Anyone inclined to agree/disagree?

[Alex Lees]

Although London Zoo had the enclosure labelled as Black Kites, the birds are in fact Cape Verde (Red) Kites Milvus milvus fasciicauda and not Black Kites or Black-eared Kites.

Anyone inclined to agree/disagree?

Hi Ilya

The birds are Black Kites, read the Johnson et al. 2005 paper appended to post #12 (http://www.surfbirds.com/forum/showpost.php?p=6806&postcount=12) All five of the birds taken into captivity "clustered within the black kite clade of the subspecies M. migrans migrans" They may however retain some Red Kite ancestry, Milvus milvus fasciicauda appears to have undergone a gradual decline to extinction which was latterly accelerated by introgression with Black Kites. For more on the history of this taxon see the Hille and Thiollay paper "The imminent extinction of the Kites Milvus milvus fasciicauda and Milvus m. migrans on the Cape Verde Islands" (attached).

cheers

Alex

Ps. what do we really know for sure about the putative Black-eared Kite?

[jamesg]

Ps. what do we really know for sure about the putative Black-eared Kite?

At the very least, I think we can say for sure that the "candidate" bird pictured on the Winterton website is a 2cal Red Kite...

[jamesg]

I'm going to propose some hypotheses:

The bird depicted in the top set of photos on the Winterton website here:

http://www.birdwatch.plus.com/kites.html

is the same bird, with a mangled tail as on the left of of the photograph here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/andrewmac/419519987/



The streaks on the neck and breast of the Winterton bird are clearly much thicker and bolder than this London Zoo individual (visible best in the 6th and 7th pics down). Also the bill is largely yellow, lacking the dark tip of the LZ individual (which is a nominate Black Kite, as Alex has said). So they are surely not the same bird. As I said above, the Winterton bird looks like a worn 2cal Red Kite to me.

[Josh Jones]

As I said above, the Winterton bird looks like a worn 2cal Red Kite to me.

I'd second that.

[Sean Nixon]

The plot seems to be thickening! The second Boyton bird was certainly striking close up, but less so at a distance. The upper parts, including the tail, looked pretty consistent with Western Black kite (first thumbnail).
Attached is a shot of a Black kite taken in Spain by dick forsman. The bird is strongly reminiscent of the Boyton 2.
There is another shot on forsman's website.

best
Sean

[Ilya Maclean]

The streaks on the neck and breast of the Winterton bird are clearly much thicker and bolder than this London Zoo individual (visible best in the 6th and 7th pics down). Also the bill is largely yellow, lacking the dark tip of the LZ individual (which is a nominate Black Kite, as Alex has said). So they are surely not the same bird. As I said above, the Winterton bird looks like a worn 2cal Red Kite to me.

Having now managed to bypass the flickr pages’ security to download the image and adjust the brightness, I agree entirely (my monitor shows all the pictures as very dark, making ID tricky). Andrew Grieves seems fairly adament it’s a Black-eared Kite (see e-mail excerpt on Winterton website), but I guess we’ll have to wait until he’s back to find out why. However, I like others, really can't see anything other than Red Kite here.

Out of interest, and assuming it is indeed a Red Kite, how did you age it? I’m guessing it has something to do with the retention of some juvenile features such as the pale fringes on the greater underwing coverts and contrasting bill, but obvious adult-like features such as the heavy streaking on the breast.

[forktail]

Hi there

some upperwing/underwing coverts are pale-fringed juv feathers etc

which I see you mentioned Ilya!

Tim

[winterdune]

The birds on the Winterton website flew over my head one after the other. I have to say I thought at the time that they were both very similar structurally. The bird with the knackered tail was simply slightly beefier in the chest with heavier streaking and a browner upper tail. Nevertheless the upperwing was identical to the Red. I have no experience of these "red" Black Kites, but structurally I think this was closer to Red than Black.
Sean

[Peter Hobbs]

As usual I'm a bit late into the fray and it would appear that I've developed a habit of bumping into 'dodgy' birds!(i.e wierd chiffchaffs).Going along with Sean Nixons comment regarding the second black kite at Boyton,that it wasn't as striking at a distance,I was quite surprised when I saw Seans image detailing the underside of this bird and showing its bright features.I had I admit,not been treated to an overhead view like this and my initial impressions were of a fairly dull bird (light conditions were not very good at the time).It did actually appear a bit brighter when I saw the bird again a week later, in much sunnier conditions and for a moment, at closer quarters although again, it mainly afforded views of its upper parts.My description submitted to Suffolk Ornithogists Rarities Commitee recently suggests that the upper surfaces are typical for black kite.The earlier B.K. seen at Boyton had of course obvious white patches on its scapulars which I expect would help to sort this one out from London Zoo's escapee's.

[skyflyte]

I'd second that.

Thirded. It is surely impossible for a European Black Kite to show such a vividly white and clearly demarcated white patch on the under-primaries. The bird photographed by Forsman in Spain has relatively distinct patches but they're nothing like as strong as on the Winterton bird.

[macrourus]

Sorry, but are you talking about the bird in the photos of the 1st post? If yes, I can't see any Red Kite at all, at least not a pure one. Why a Red Kite should have clearly 6 fingered short primaries rather then 5 very long and narrow, with 5th much longer than this bird???!!!

Why should show such barring on remiges and rectrices?

it looks like a very old Black Kite or at most an hybrid for which I can't be sure of course in this pictures....

Cheers

AC
________
Wong Amat Tower Condo Pattaya (http://pattayaluxurycondos.com)

[skyflyte]

Sorry, but are you talking about the bird in the photos of the 1st post?

Hi Andrea, it's actually these images where the identity was questioned:
http://www.birdwatch.plus.com/kites.html

[macrourus]

Ok, then this IS surely a Red Kite very good juv.!! No problem at all...

I was referring toa different pictures showing instead a Black Kite
________
Avandia settlement information (http://www.classactionsettlements.org/lawsuit/avandia/)

[Y Gylfinir]

:err:
Hello.
It's a Red Kite not a Black !!!!!!!!!

[Bikerrod]

Below is what I believe to a common buzzard taken isle of wight a week ago.
To me there does'nt seem a lot of difference. The under belly is different but the rest seems quite similar.
What am I missing guys?
Or could this be a buzzard Black Kite cross. The tails don't seem very forked to me.
(I'm very green here, so be gentle)

[AndyB]

Hi Rod, raptors are quite tricky even for the experienced. Your bird does show a classic Common Buzzard. Some features are the short tail and barred underwings and whitish barred belly. Kites are generally long-winged, long tailed birds and have darker underparts and underwings than Buzzards (simplistic generalization). Getting to see one in real life and you'll be surprised how distinctive they are from Buzzards. Best, Andy

[Bikerrod]

Thanks for the education.
I asked because I have been told of many kites in the chilterns.
I have thought about going to Princes Risborough just to photo the kites.
I reckon I would be a bit ticked off if I went all that way and got the wrong bird.