![]() The female lays one to three eggs and incubation takes twenty-four to twenty-eight days. Other times, they may repair and reuse their old nesting site. Both adults build a new nest each year and they bring materials like sticks, lichens, and moss to the nesting site. Nests of Swallow-tailed Kites are often concealed by foliage in the tallest of trees in the forest. When catching prey to feed their mates and their young, they will usually carry the food item with their feet and then transfer it to their beaks to give to the female. They eat their prey immediately during their flight. They also eat small snakes, frogs, lizards, and small birds when flying in from the treetops. Insects like dragonflies, cicadas, wasps, bees, crickets, and beetles are their primary food. Swallow-tailed Kites are graceful, acrobatic hunters and they usually catch their prey mid-air. Also, summer is the best time to see them since they migrate to South America for the winter. Swallow-tailed Kites almost always spend their time in flight so it’s best to look skyward when looking for them. When nesting, look for them in tall trees around open areas with an abundance of small prey to feed their young. You can find Swallow-tailed Kites in swamps, marshes, and humid, lowland forests. Swallow-tailed Kites are predominantly resident in South America but they breed around the Gulf Coast of the United States. Juveniles are paler in comparison and their tails are not that deeply forked. Their long, forked tails resemble a swallow’s hence the name “swallow-tailed”. Their underwings are both black and white. Males and females look similar and have white heads and underparts and black bills, flight feathers, tails, and feet. Swallow-tailed Kites are large but slender birds of prey that are most often seen hovering in the skies with their distinctive forked tail. They are recorded in 9% of summer checklists submitted by bird watchers for the state. Swallow-tailed Kites spend the breeding season in Florida and are mainly spotted from mid-February to September. There are many types of birds of prey that can be spotted in Florida, including owls, hawks, eagles, and vultures. In North America, they are found mostly in southern states. Kites can be found worldwide but are more in warmer regions. However, Double-toothed Kites are accidental species here. There are 5 species of kites in Florida that have been spotted and they are the Swallow-tailed Kite, Snail Kite, Mississippi Kite, White-tailed Kite, and Double-toothed Kite. They spend a lot of time soaring looking for prey, so looking up is a great way to spot them, even on car journeys. ![]() Kites are small birds of prey that are known for their amazing ability to fly into the wind and hover, which is known as kiting.
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