Red Kite

Milvus milvus

Photo by vicky_king
Photographed near Aberystwyth in Mid Wales.

Includes Cape Verde Kite (see taxonomy section)

Distribution

Confined to the Western Palearctic the Red Kite is found as a breeding species in Iberia and discontinuously from France east to Belarus and the Ukraine. In Britain it has long been reduced to a tiny remnant population in central Wales but in recent years extensive release programmes have led to breeding once again in parts of Scotland and England and in 2000 more than 400 pairs breeding or attempting to breed in the UK. Outside Iberia populations in mainland Europe are scattered with isolated pockets in central and eastern France, eastern Belgium, Luxembourg and southern parts of the Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden. The range becomes more continuous from Germany and northern Switzerland east to north Poland and Belarus and south to the northwestern shores of the Black Sea. There is a very isolated resident population in the Caucasus. A few small pockets still survive in Slovakia, Hungary and northern Yugoslavia but it is now very rare in South-East Europe. In the Mediterranean area Red Kites breed on the Balearics, Corsica and Sardinia and on Sicily and in the southern third of Italy. It is now a very rare bird in North-West Africa where small numbers can still be found in northern Morocco and may possibly still breed in Algeria and Tunisia. Rare and decreasing on the Canary Islands and highly endangered and close to extinction in the Cape Verde Islands.

All island populations of Red Kites are mainly resident with some dispersal, mainly of immatures, as are birds from Iberia, Wales, France and southern Europe. Birds from the north and east are more migratory but some tend to stay in the breeding area through the winter, especially in recent decades. Most winter in southern Europe from Spain to Greece or small numbers cross at Gibraltar to winter in North Africa. Red Kites prefer to cross water by the shortest route and appear in small numbers at the major raptor migration watchpoints. The reintroduction programmes in Britain have been highly successful particularly in the Black Isle of Scotland and the Chiltern Hills of England. A bird from the Scottish reintroduction programme has wandered to Iceland and vagrants have been recorded in the Channel Islands.

Taxonomy

Subspecies: Birds on the Cape Verde Islands have been considered a subspecies of the Red Kite, M. m. fasciicauda, but it has been suggested that they are hybrids between Red and Black Kites or more recently (Sibley & Monroe, 1996) that they represent a full species. However they are classified, Cape Verde Kites are now extremely rare and none were found during a search in spring 2001. However, later the same year four individuals were found on Boavista. The decline of this form is thought in part to be due to the expansion of the Black Kite on the islands. Johnson et al. (2005) found that phylogenetic evidence suggests that Cape Verde Kite specimens collected between 1897 and 1924 belonged to a Red Kite clade that was not restricted to the islands, and that kites collected on the Cape Verde Islands in 2002 were all Black Kites.

Habitat

Favours hilly country with a mixture of mature deciduous woodland and open fields, sometimes near rivers and lakes but less tied to water than the Black Kite.

References

Johnson, J.A., Watson, R.T. and Mindell, D.P. (2005) Prioritizing species conservation: does the Cape Verde Kite exist?. Proc. R. Soc. Lond. Ser. B 272: 1365-1371.

Bird Song

<flashmp3>Milvus milvus (song).mp3</flashmp3>
Listen in an external program

External Links

• Redkites.net

Search for photos of Red Kite in the gallery