Whistling Kite in hot pursuit
One of our most common raptors in south-east Queensland and the far north of
NSW is the Whistling Kite, which I have never before seen hunting in this
fashion.
This month, we stayed at Brooms Head - a beautiful spot around which we
recorded 99 species - also visiting nearby Sandon in Yuragir National Park.
On the Sandon estuary beach we watched flocks of Silver Gulls and Crested
and Little Terns, which rose in an almost ritual flap every time a Whistling
Kite soared lazily overhead at a height of 50 metres or so. (The kite
returned from time to time to a nest high in a Norfolk Pine - whether it was
breeding or not at this time I couldn't tell).
Then as the kite approached for the umpteenth time, it glided swiftly down,
losing altitude to be about seven metres or so above the flock at the time
the alarm was given. As the flock of about 60 gulls and terns took to the
air, the kite locked on to one Little Tern, pursuing it through the rapidly
dispersing mass and ignoring the other birds. As the Little tern jigged and
twisted, the kite turned its wings this way and that in hot pursuit - an
awesome performance in such a large and apparently 'lazy' bird. At the far
perimeter of the airborne flock, the tern twisted its way through a jigging
180 degree turn, followed, incredibly, by the kite. But by then the kite had
lost too much ground and although it still followed the same tern it was now
several metres behind and gave up - flapping and soaring back to its higher
patrolling altitude.
Are there many records of such determined hunting of live airborne prey by
Whistling Kites? I have never seen this before but then, maybe I don't spend
enough time on the beach.
Other sightings of interest (to us) were a flock of 10 White Faced Herons
flying north above the beach just south of Brooms Head, and a pair of Beach
Stone Curlews with juvenile at Sandon - well guarded and warned of our
approach - and the approach of the Whistling Kite - by a Masked Plover. We
also saw a pair of Brown Falcons, one of which (on a telegraph pole) was
being dive-bombed by a Black Shouldered Kite.
Bob Lake
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