Bygone birding: John Gould on the beautiful black-winged kite - its range and manner of flight

 

Intrigued by a beetle - Gould's quirky study of  black-winged kites 

Below is how ornithologist and artist John Gould described the species he depicted so exquisitely in the portrait above. Picture and text are in the volume on raptors in masterful Gould's five-volume Birds of Europe, published in 1837. 

When we consider the wide range of this beautiful species, scattered as it is over all the temperate and warmer portions of the Old World, it is a matter of no surprise that its capture has of late years been so frequent in Europe. 

It is abundantly dispersed along the banks of the Nile, and in fact the whole of Africa and India is inhabited by it.

Neither do specimens from Java and New Holland present any specific differences from those taken in Europe. 

In all probability, no part of Europe affords it a permanent residence.

Spain, Italy, and the Grecian Islands are the portions of our quarter of the globe most frequented by the Black-winged Kite.

Instances are, however, on record of its having been captured in the middle of Germany.

It must, therefore, like many other species, be regarded merely as an irregular visitor which has crossed the Mediterranean from the opposite shores of Africa.

 From the great length of its wings, together with its short and feathered tarsi, we are led to infer that it is capable of rapid and powerful flight, and that, like its allies in America, it possesses the power of remaining suspended in the air for a great length of time.

Its food consists principally of insects, chiefly captured in the air, to which are sparingly added hzards, frogs, snakes and birds.

The sexes are very much alike in colour, but the female is said to be rather larger than her mate.

The young of the first autumn may be distinguished from the adults by their having the back strongly tinged with brown, and the end of each feather encircled with huffy white; the sides of the chest brown, and the feathers on the breast streaked down the centre with dark brown.

The adult has the head and the whole of the back of a fine grey; the centre of the wings black; the primaries and secondaries greyish brown, with lighter grey edges; the shoulders of the wings, throat, all the under surface, and tail pure white; cere and toes yellow; bill and claws black; irides orange.

We have figured an adult and a young bird of the natural size.