Red Kite

Red Kite – Bird Of Prey

The Red Kite is a fairly large sized bird of prey that comes from the Accipitridae family of birds.

Physical Characteristics

The Red Kite gets between 24 and 27 inches long and has a wingspan of  between 175 and 195 cm. It weighs between 800 and 1300 grams and the female is slightly larger than the male. It has a long forked shaped tail, and a red and white body.

Habitat and Location

Red Kites are known to live in Europe, Africa, Turkey, and even have appeared in Finland, Israel and Libya.

Diet

The Red Kite eats little mammals like mice, shrews, voles, rabbits and hares. It also will eat carrion, sometimes finding dead sheep or game birds. They also have been known to eat birds, reptiles, amphibians and earthworms.

Breeding Facts

The adult red kites prefer to live alone except during breeding season.  They are migratory and breed in the UK, or Spain to name a couple of places. They may maintain as many as five alternate nest sites. Male and female both help to build the nest, which is made of sticks and grass and lined with sheep’s wool or vegetation. The nest is built high up in a tree on a limb or in a fork.
Red Kites mate when they are two or three years old and they mate for life.

The nest is built in March or April. The female lays two to four eggs at intervals of one every three days. The female sits on the eggs and the male brings her food. They hatch in about a month.

Since the eggs are laid so far apart, it is common for some chicks to be bigger and stronger, which can result in the smaller one dying for lack of food or being killed by the stronger one.