White-tailed Kite: A rare raptor, and an unfriendly reception
I was fortunate enough this week to spot a juvenile White-tailed Kite preening its plumage in a tall elm tree at our place. These striking birds are among my favorites and are one of the most uncommon raptors found in the Tehachapi area - most people have never even heard of them.
White-tailed Kites (Elanus leucurus) are medium-sized birds of prey that typically hunt in open grasslands, fallow fields and savannahs.
They are mostly white and can be mistaken for gulls from a distance, though if you see them up close their sharply hooked bills make it clear that they are raptors.
Though mostly white, they do have dark patches on the bend of their wings and for a time were known as “Black-shouldered Kites.” They also have a black mask surrounding each eye. You can sometimes see one of these elegant, fairy-like birds as it hovers over an open field, waiting for a rodent to appear. But instead of flap- ping their wings to hover in place, White-tailed Kites often face into the wind and hang suspended, largely motionless, like an actual kite tethered at the end of an invisible string.
These beautiful birds were almost rendered extinct in California during the 1930s and 40s due to shooting, egg collectors and habitat loss, but their numbers have recovered. One of the interesting things about them, however, is that they are not common anywhere - in the U.S. they are mostly found in California, though small populations can be found in Oregon, Louisiana and Florida. There are also populations in South America. White-tailed Kites are just one of those species, like ring-tailed cats, wolverines, Sierra tiger lilies, legless lizards and others that are never abundant - they’re always something of a rarity.
White-tailed Kites eat almost exclusively small mammals, and somehow songbirds are aware of this and show little fear of Kites, even when the Kites are hunting above them. When it comes to accipiters, however, like Sharp-shinned Hawks and Cooper’s Hawks, which eat mostly other birds, the resident songbirds wisely leave them alone, preferring to crouch in a dense shrub until the Sharpie or Cooper’s vacates the premises.
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White-tailed Kites are just one of those species, like ring-tailed cats, wolverines, Sierra tiger lilies, legless lizards and others that are never abundant - they're always something of a rarity. White-tailed Kites eat almost exclusively small mammals
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