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White-tailed kite

Elegant, white and gray raptor in flight with a small rodent in its talons.

A white-tailed kite pair is occupying an oak / willow grove in the bottomlands, and appears to be preparing to nest soon. White-tailed kites are very elegant-looking raptors and are very specialized predators. They mainly eat California voles in our region, and in recent years, they haven't been active at Pinnacles. However, California voles have had an irruptive year in 2025 and the kites appear to be taking advantage of that. Here is one of the kite adults flying with vole prey.

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NPS / Gavin Emmons

Public domain:Full Granting Rights

Image

Pinnacles National Park, Code: PINN
San Francisco Bay Area Network, Code: SFAN

Pinnacles National Park
Pinnacles National Park, California
Latitude: 36.4753494262695, Longitude: -121.173400878906

SFAN Inventory and Monitoring Program

04/01/2025

04/01/2025

Public Can View

NPS / Gavin Emmons

NPS / Gavin Emmons

Person: Jessica Weinberg McClosky
Organization: San Francisco Bay Area Inventory & Monitoring Network
Role: Science Communication Specialist

Friday, May 16, 2025 7:14:22 PM

Thursday, May 22, 2025 2:56:45 PM

20250401 wtki flight 1.jpg

Canon Canon, Canon EOS R7 1000, EF400mm f/4 DO IS II USM +1.4x III

1/1000 sec at f / 6.3

560 mm

ISO 1000

Tuesday, April 1, 2025 12:09:33 PM

jpg

526.3 kB

2025-05-16T14:56:57-04:00

Scenic , Monitoring