IDENTIFICATION

45-51 cm. Females are slightly larger and heavier. Adults are highly distinctive as they have chestnut upperparts and belly and finely streaked white head, neck and breast.

Underwings of juveniles show a prominent pale panel extending over the inner primaries and their respective greater coverts and the bases of the outer primaries, as well as a pale belly and broadly streaked chest. The upperparts are dark brown above with pale head (apart from blackish mask behind eye), wing coverts, tips to greater coverts, inner primaries and uppertail coverts.

DISTRIBUTION & HABITAT PREFERENCE

Elsewhere in the range Brahminy Kite occupies a wide variety of lowland, open country habitats, often near water. Consequently, it is no surprise that all HK records have occurred in the Deep Bay area.

OCCURRENCE

On the basis of a series of records during 1987-1990, mainly at Mai Po and involving a minimum of six individuals, at least two of which were long-staying, it seems likely that a small number of breeding birds were temporarily established near HK.

1987: up to two juveniles at Tsim Bei Tsui on 29 August and at Mai Po on 13 September.

1988-89: a juvenile at Mai Po from 1 November 1988 that remained to moult into adult plumage during summer 1989 and was last seen on 25 November 1989. It was joined by two different juveniles, the first from 15 July 1989 and the second from 15 August 1989. These two juveniles were subsequently seen together on 26 August and 9 December.

1990: at least one of the juveniles from the previous year remained at Mai Po until 4 March 1990. Another juvenile was reported there on 13 October 1990.

2014: a first calendar-year bird at Mai Po on 19 September 2014.

Vaughan and Jones (1913) observed this species in summer in Guangxi where they stated it appeared to take the place of Black Kite. Yen (1933-34) described it as very numerous in summer at Wuzhou on the border of Guangxi and Guangdong, but less numerous there in winter.

BEHAVIOUR, FORAGING & DIET

The only food items reported in HK are dead and dying fish.

RANGE & SYSTEMATICS

Occurs from the Indian subcontinent east through southern Indochina to the Malay peninsula and north into south and east China; also occurs in Greater and Lesser Sundas, Papua New Guinea and coastal regions of northern and eastern Australia (Debus et al. 2021). In China it occurs in coastal provinces from southern Shandong to Yunnan, though the relative paucity of records in HK suggests it is scarce (Liu and Chen 2020).

The nominate form occurs from India to Vietnam and China including HK. Three other subspecies are also recognised.

CONSERVATION STATUS

IUCN: Least Concern. Population trend decreasing.