Bird
Bird
Plumbeous Kite
Ictinia plumbea
The Plumbeous Kite is a sleek, slate-grey raptor that arrives in Trinidad in large numbers each year to breed, filling the sky over forest and forest edge with graceful, buoyant flight as it hawks dragonflies and large insects on the wing.
The Plumbeous Kite is a sleek, slate-grey raptor that arrives in Trinidad in large numbers each year to breed, filling the sky over forest and forest edge with graceful, buoyant flight as it hawks dragonflies and large insects on the wing.
Identification
A medium-sized kite around 32 to 37 cm long, with uniformly dark slate-grey plumage, long pointed wings, and a squared or slightly notched tail. In flight, a translucent rufous panel is visible on the primaries against the light. It has a graceful, tern-like flight style, often soaring and gliding for long periods with barely a wingbeat.
Migration
Present in Trinidad mainly from around March to September, when birds arrive from wintering grounds in South America (chiefly Brazil, Bolivia, and Paraguay) to breed. It is a partial long-distance migrant across its range, with the T&T population largely absent outside the breeding season. Large gatherings can be seen migrating together, sometimes numbering in the hundreds.
Status in T&T
A common seasonal breeding visitor to forest, forest edge, and semi-open woodland in Trinidad, hunting flying insects such as dragonflies, cicadas, and large beetles on the wing, and occasionally taking small vertebrates. Not threatened, and it is protected as native wildlife under the Conservation of Wildlife Act.
