Re Swallow-tailed Kite diet:

Paul, that's a good point you made since it is out of range and its normal prey.  The fact it perched and ate a prey item isn't the norm--an indication of a different than norm prey--since it normally eats on the fly.  Noting what prey it eats could offer some good science for future researchers.  This is an understudied bird and birders' notes of a kite out of range could be useful for researchers.

"At 13 Florida nests, 52–85% of prey items consisted of insects, frogs, and nestling birds (Sutton 1955, Snyder 1974, Meyer and Collopy 1990, M. Wright, R. Green, and N. Reed unpubl. data)."

"Except for 1 reference to fruit-eating in winter (Lemke 1979), the only nonbreeding season data are for stomach contents of 8 Florida kites collected in mid-Jul, during premigration phase (Lee and Clark 1993). Of 345 prey items, 340 (98.6%) were insects, and 90% of these were 20–30 mm in length. Of the insects, 42.4% were grasshoppers (Acrididae), 19.2% leaf-footed bugs (Coreidae), and 12.7% palmetto weevils (Rhynchophorus cruenlatus). The remainder were fire ants (Solenopsis invicta, an exotic), horntails (Eriotrenex formosanus), and various hemipterans. Many were flightless species or life stages and must have been captured directly from foliage."

Bob Stalnaker
Longwood, FL

Meyer, Kenneth D. 1995. Swallow-tailed Kite (Elanoides forficatus), The Birds of North America Online (A. Poole, Ed.). Ithaca: Cornell Lab 
of Ornithology; Retrieved from the Birds of North America Online: http://bna.birds.cornell.edu/bna/species/138
doi:10.2173/bna.138 


On Sunday, August 17, 2014 3:17 PM, Paul Hurtado <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
  


I thought I'd add that birds like kites also need healthy "resident" prey
populations.

While watching the kite yesterday, it plucked a prey item out of the
soybeans (not seen well enough to ID) which it ate on the wing, and later
it perched on a leafless treetop to eat what looked like a katydid (based
on its size and wingshape). No doubt it's days-long stopover is being
heavily influenced by food availability.

Kites slay more than just dragons, and like so many other insectivorous
bird species, their existence relies on healthy habitat that supports a
diverse prey base (read: lots of different insects) so they have year-round
access to food.

To get a handle on what this particular bird is eating, I encourage
observers to note any insect (or frog or mammal etc) prey that this bird
eats, as well as any candidate food items seen or heard in the area (e.g.
any dragonflies, or audible katydids or cicadas).

Good birding,
Paul Hurtado
Columbus
On Aug 17, 2014 9:57 AM, "Bill Whan" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> I gather that only 1% of the world's dragonfly species undertake
> migrations, but apparently some large and tasty ones pass heading south in
> the US each fall in large numbers, and some birds specialize in eating
> them. Some of them are large enough to be too much to handle for the
> average bird, but raptors like kites prey on them. Because large numbers of
> these dragonflies--and it would be great to hear from dragonfly-watchers
> about this--must pass through Ohio this time of year, it seems that a few
> of the bird species adept at catching them, like kites, might move north to
> intercept them. This still seems to have been the case in recent years,
> rare as it is.
>        Formerly--and we are talking about 150+ years ago--the
> swallow-tailed kite had a range into southern Canada, where they no doubt
> ate dragonflies that no doubt also had a northerly range.
> I read in an 1854 work on hunting in Wisconsin that these kites were "at
> one time quite numerous on our prairies, and quite annoying to us in grouse
> shooting.” Coues in 1874 had extensive remarks on its presence in North
> Dakota at the time. Ohio's Wheaton reported a kite shot near Pataskala in
> my area on 8/22/1878. which was first thought to be a bald eagle from P.T.
> Barnum's show and discarded, then eventually rescued, though the specimen
> has since apparently been lost.
>        It's probably unwise to celebrate that these charming birds are
> returning to our latitude in larger numbers. We just have more observers
> who report birds than we used to. Dragonflies, and their predators,
> continue to diminish. A few lucky Ohioans may get to see one during the
> warm months, but if you want to get a taste of their former abundance,
> there are some Florida spots that still routinely provide hundreds of them
> at a time at this time of year...what a show!
> Bill Whan
> Cols
>
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