Visitors 45
Modified 21-Dec-23
Created 21-Sep-16
120 photos
Kites! Kite behavior: catching and devouring voles, resting in their favorite tree, hassling larger hawks, being hassled by crows; kites in flight; and kites kiting: hovering, quite still, in the sky while beating their wings. This is the way they find voles, moving in the grass below. Then the kite descends straight down. The unsuspecting vole does not see a bird in flight, just a shadow getting larger and larger, until the kite dives at the last minute and it is too late. Then the kite carries the vole to a tree and eats it, piece by piece, swallowing the last bit in one big gulp.
The most interesting behavior is the exchange of a vole in the air, from parent to youngster. This helps the young kite learn flying skills, before it is able to catch a vole itself.
Young kits have a buffy wash on the breast for a few weeks [Sibley]. This can be seen in several images here.
Dudley Carlson tells me that the name "kite" began with the bird, and was then applied to the paper kite we fly on a string, named after the bird and the way it hovers in the air, beating.
See also the kite photography of Peter LaTourrette: <http://www.birdphotography.com/species/wtki.html>
