Swallow-tailed Kite Migration: Kites Continue Farther into South America

Thursday, October 3, 2019

Kites Continue Farther into South America

Good news from our 16 GPS-tracked Swallow-tailed Kites – a new check-in from PBC-ERM Male in Rondônia, Brazil! There he joins Sanibel, Apopka, and JAX above the agricultural fields. Just a bit farther south, Lacombe, Suwannee, and Ponchitolawa are moving through Mato Grosso, Brazil.

Bayou Vincent is holding down Santa Cruz, Bolivia, and Hobolochitto is 900 miles northwest of her in the state of Amazonas, Brazil.

Farther north in Colombia are five birds that we haven’t heard from in a while due to the lack of cell coverage needed to upload their location data: Sarasota, Pritchard, and Sawgrass are on the east of the Andes Mountains, and OK and Babcock are on the west side.

Wilson, our last GPS-tracked kite to leave the U.S., continues to make his way down the west side of the Andes Mountains. We are still waiting to get an upload from PBC-ERM Female who last reported from the Panama/Colombia border.

Safe travels Swallow-tailed Kites!

Avian Research and Conservation Institute

Once seen along the Mississippi River as far north as Minnesota, the Swallow-tailed Kite's range is now just a third its historic size. In the last 40 years, up to 80% of formerly common bird species have declined.

ARCI works to develop management techniques for these at-risk birds, but we must apply them now, before their recovery becomes impossible.

Since 1996, we have used satellite telemetry to study the ecology of Swallow-tailed Kites, including the 10,000 mile migration they make each year to the humid plains of Brazil and back to the lowlands of the southeast U.S.

Avian Research and Conservation Institute (ARCI) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that has gained attention and respect for difficult, problem-solving research on rare and imperiled birds.

Learn more at www.arcinst.org