[Squirrelx]

I know this is an old thread but as I understand this section went dormant for a while I hope it is okay to resurrect it now.

Incidentally, I posted a similar message to this elsewhere on the forum recently but it vanished when "onemind" did!

Until a couple of years back I had never seen a red kite in the wild. Last year one adopted the skies above where I live as its territory. This year the one has become two. It is fascinating to watch them on the prowl as they either "quarter" the sky or "describe" figures of eight (8).

Curiously, they never seem to catch anything. All the smaller "usual" birds which come to my feeders go totally silent and vanish like magic (same way they do when a thunderstorm is brewing/occurring).

The only one I have seen break cover is a carrion crow. There are a number which roost and nest in the trees to the back of me. It clearly decided the, on this occasion, solitary red kite was a threat and came at it like a bullet out of a gun. There followed the most spectacular aerial dog-fight which the carrion crow won, seeing off the red kite in a very triumphant fashion. Didn't stop the red kite coming back the following day, though!