Sunday, December 9, 2012

white tailed kite

 This will be the first post of many in a series involving birds of our area here on the central coast of california. hopefully i will continue to get photos of more and be able to continue editing and adding to this subject. on a foggy misty day along the coast we were able to spot a handful of birds including some of my favorite raptors. these kites were taking advantage of the foggy day to hunt in the cattle fields along the highway sometimes sharing the ground just a few feet from the cows. these kites are less common than other raptors in our area due to the overabundance of red tail hawks along the same stretch of coast line. also like a lot of the animals of the time period during the 1920's and 30's the kites population was decimated from hunting, shooting, and egg collecting. the california department of fish and game initiated a hawk rehabilitation project in which they set aside grazing areas as protected habitat for the raptors and now the kite is listed under the least concern status due to there flourishing existance now.




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