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The Black Kite is a predatory bird of the Hawk family. Interestingly, representatives are not colored at all in a black "crow" color, but rather in a dark brown shade. It is easy to recognize it in the sky - one-color plumage, a forked peculiar tail (not typical for birds of prey), elongated and curved wings. The voice of the black kite is also characteristic - you will not confuse it with other members of the family. Hunters describe his "trills" as the neighing of a foal.
Appearance
The bird is covered with a uniform dark brown, sometimes brownish plumage. Only at the end of the wings, the overall shade smoothly turns into black. The belly is a bit lighter brown.
The predatory kite is very fast and maneuverable due to its small growth - a little over half a meter. Representatives weigh on average up to 1 kilogram (males are a bit smaller).
The span of the long wings of a predator can reach up to one and a half meters in diameter.
Outwardly, the female and the male practically do not differ, the color of the plumage is the same, only the dimensions of the latter are slightly smaller.
The base of the beak of the black kite is yellowish, and the beak is black, slightly curved down.
The legs of the bird are rough and also yellowish with tenacious and long black claws.
Hunting and nutrition
That is, a lazy kite is an excellent hunter, but prefers not to waste energy and strength, when you can simply collect edibles from available places. Often, the “table” of a bird is made up of sick or dying animals, wounded animals, and also dead fish thrown ashore.
Such behavior of a feathered predator allows him to give a prize for “sanitary activity”, which is practically not characteristic of members of the family.
The kite hunts mostly sharp pike - in flight with a whistle the bird strives for the victim, catches it with sharp claws and pulls it with its beak, killing.
Breeding
During the mating season, black kites gather in conglomerates to be able to protect offspring from a predator. On average, such a flock has about 100 individuals.
The males have characteristic mating behavior, in which he fights for the female with other members, charms her with beautiful singing.
After mating, the pair creates nests next to the others. On average, 1 square.kilometer can be about 10 or more nests. Mostly they are organized in the area of forest edges and fields in trees (more often on oaks) with a height of 2 to 20 meters. Sometimes eggs lay in abandoned alien nests or form a clutch on lake snags.
The nest is mainly composed of feathers, branches, lumps of earth, a piece of newspaper or rags, thorny bushes, flowers and wool of prey. That is, a black kite, like a crow, carries everything that “lies wrong.” Into the nest. Protecting the laying of birds is not enough, for example, when a person appears, they only utter mournful shouting in the distance. The female can peck and flap its wings, and the male can swoop down from above in order to hit the offender with a powerful beak.
The female lays in the nest from 2 to 5 medium eggs. Incubation lasts about a month, during which the caring bird constantly incubates eggs. Periodically, there is the male’s help, but the rest of the time he just gets food for the family. Nestlings become completely independent one and a half to two months after their birth, and they reach sexual maturity by 2 years.
The life span of the black kite is about 30 years.
Habitat
Recently, the number of black kites has sharply decreased, due to poaching and human activities (drainage of reservoirs, chemistry, deforestation, etc.), massive natural disasters. There has been a sharp decline in the number of representatives in the CIS countries, in particular, Russia. People and birds are badly side by side together.
Mostly black kite lives on the territory of Eurasia (except for the tundra zone), as well as the Australian and African continents (except for desert areas). These birds are migratory, so with the onset of cold weather (early autumn) they migrate south to warm countries (Africa, Australia, India). There they get along well with local kites.
The greatest density of black kites per square kilometer is found in India, with the highest concentration noted in the capital. 50 thousand square meters. kilometers of the country is home to more than 20 thousand pairs. Black kite in terms of the number of representatives in India ranks second after the Bengal vulture.
In Asia, birds were noticed in Hong Kong, Bangkok and Manila.On the African continent, the black kite chose Arush, Cairo, Bangui and Antananarivo.
The predatory kite is well tamed by man and quite willingly makes contact, which makes it possible to use it when hunting other birds and animals.
Video: Black Kite (Milvus migrans)
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