Bird of Prey ID please

[telchine]

Can anyone identify these birds?

[Jim Ford]

Red Kite - Milvus milvus

Jim

[AshLee]

Yes, and lovely birds they are

Where did you see them, telchine (welcome to WAB, by the way)?

[HamieRaptorcliff]

Look like Red Kites to me too.

Wish we had them here in the West Midlands.

Cool pics!!

[telchine]

Originally Posted by Jim Ford

Red Kite - Milvus milvus

I see a lot of birds of prey and I struggle to identify them (not helped by my poor eyesight). What should I look out for when trying to distinguish red kites from other similar birds?

Originally Posted by AshLee

Where did you see them

Berkshire

[thebeard]

Originally Posted by telchine

I see a lot of birds of prey and I struggle to identify them (not helped by my poor eyesight). What should I look out for when trying to distinguish red kites from other similar birds?

long narrowish wings with white bars and black tips, grey head, fanned tail, thats what i'd look for, not sure what would be a confusion species, buzzard maybe, which tend to be more uniform in colour apart from largely white underwings.

[piedsangel]

oh yes most certainly red kites! beautiful birds! you lucky devil!!

[helen159]

We get loads of Red Kites (High Wycombe) and they are easily mistaken for buzzards, but I find the easiest way to distinguish is that buzzards have a fan tail and red kites have a forked tail. Looking up at them flying around (they often seem to soar together) they look very similar, even bearing the striped underwings in mind. Hope this helps.

[wyvern1]

Whereabouts did you see these? Indeed, Britains most beautiful raptor in my mind.

I spend many days a month watching and photographing Red Kites and am very interested in how and where they are increasing their terretories.

[helen159]

Buckinghamshire seems to be the place to be to spot these - you can start looking at them from the M40. There are always a few flying over Hughenden park in High Wycombe, Marlow, Turville, and any other open space nearby. I would go as far as to say that anywhere I walk near High Wycombe there is always at least two in the sky.