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Project Noah Nature School
Haliastur sphenurus
Adult birds are a pale buff on the head, breast and tail, with browner wings and black flight feathers. Immature birds are a heavily streaked reddish-brown with prominent pale spots on the wings. Throughout their lives, Whistling Kites have bone-colored legs and feet, which are unfeathered.
Wetlands
That wing patterning is actually quite typical of kites, particularly during molt.
I suspect it's just moulted the lost feathers. They have to moult it in stages - if they lost all their primaries at once they wouldn't be able to fly (although this does happen to some species when they are sitting a nest).
Plenty of bird life there - and snakes in summer! Best to go very early or on a weekday. Otherwise you end up biting your tongue and boiling in the corner when all the penguin parade tourists come into the hide and bang around scaring all the birds away :-)
Spotted on Sep 22, 2013
Submitted on Oct 13, 2013
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