Plumbeous Kite Gallery

Ictinia plumbea

The Birds of the World  website introduces the Plumbeous Kite like this:  Plumbeous Kite is a slender, gray raptor of forests and forest edges. It is apparently resident throughout much of northern South America, with migratory populations north to Mexico and perhaps south to northern Argentina. It closely resembles the highly migratory Mississippi Kite (I. mississippiensis), which occurs within its range during migration and winter. Plumbeous is darker gray overall than Mississippi, lacks the white secondary patches of that species, and has unique rufous tones on the inner webs of the primaries. It feeds on insects from a perch or while in flight over the forest, particularly over the canopy or along edges. Some Plumbeous Kites also follow primates to prey on insects that are flushed by the monkeys. The stick nest of a breeding pair is placed high in a tree.

I saw and photographed my first Plumbeous Kite on the morning of August 18, 2023 in the Amazon Basin Region of Brazil.  Our small group with Jeff Parker Tours was in an observation tower watching a Harpy Eagle nest when we spotted this bird perched high in a distant tree.  It was too far away to get a good picture, but I got a photo that was good enough for indentification purposes.   For a more detailed description of this day, look here at my blog post on my Brazil trip.  Here are some of my photos of this beautiful bird.