Hi Jon,
A very interesting story. Black kites in my
experience tend to be very aggressive around nests, rapidly habituating to a
visitor and thus getting closer with their swoops until contact is made. I
remember David Baker-Gabb describing
to me almost being knocked out by a black kite whilst climbing a nest tree and
being struck on the head. You don’t mention a nest site, but perhaps they
are thinking of nesting in the near future or have been disturbed by people in
the past.
Birds certainly remember who you are. When
I was working on brown falcons they would recognise my white Hilux and start
bombing it as I drove towards the nest, before I even got out, whereas white Triton
utes of the workers were ignored, even when the workers got out and walked
under nest trees. I was looking at growth rates amongst other things and climbed
to nests regularly, at least weekly. By the third or fourth visit both sexes
would swoop within a metre or so of me, but one female did hit me once, drawing
blood and making me see stars for a while. Like you, I didn’t hear her
coming, but this makes sense for birds putting themselves in such a potentially
dangerous situation.
In any case I would argue that the bird was
seeing you as a potential predator/competitor, rather than prey. However,
perhaps it was a very optimistic kite!
Happy birding,
Paul McDonald
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dr
Paul G. McDonald
Visiting
Fellow
Department
of Zoology
La Trobe University
Bundoora, Victoria
Australia 3083
Ph:
03 9479 1876 (International replace 03 with +613)
Fax:
03 9479 1551
http://zooserv.zoo.latrobe.edu.au/Staff/mfc/PGM/Default.htm
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From:
[ On Behalf Of Jon Wren
Sent: Wednesday, 19 October 2005
8:15 PM
To: Birding-aus; Philip Veerman
Subject: [BIRDING-AUS] Re: Black
Kite swooping
Gooday Philip, Glenn, Allison and birding-aussers,
Just to clarify some points.
Leichhardt Tree Creek is an Atlas count area of remnant low
land paperbark scrub infested with rubber vine, nagoora burr etc. There are no
picnic tables and the surrounding area is utilised for horticultural purposes.
Height of paperbarks are 20-25m with trimming of trees along
the power line pathway on each side of the roadway.
Usually I hear the sound of air passing through and over the
wings when the bird swoops. On the ocassion that actual contact was made I
never heard any of the warning noises of a bird swooping. I'm 102 Kg at
6ft1" so a bit big for an item of prey.
The reason I was in high visibility gear was due to the fact
that I had completed a shift at work and decided to do a count on the way back
into Bowen and bed.
