Raptor Experts - What is this thing?

[tom turner]

Hi,

I live in middle Georgia and we've got a pair of these things that have taken up near our home. I can't figure out what they are but they are big and have fairly long, angled (boomerang) type wings. Their sound is something like "k-ree, k-ree."

Sorry for the far away shot that had to be enlarged from my 15MP Canon DSLR (w/55 mm lens). In the tall tree tops they were quite tiny. I did use a tripod to help, and set the camera on timer mode so it wouldn't shake.

Hope someone can give me the answer!

Thanks!

Tom

PS: Twice now I've seen them BOTH together on that top limb, one on top of the other. Must be mating season.

 

[pberry]

Looks like an osprey to me. They are plentiful here in Mississippi. They feed on fish mostly, just like an eagle.
Phil

 

[jkc]

Ospreys perhaps --- one of only a few raptors that show that much white on head and breast --- hard to tell from your pix... Is there a body of water nearby? Ospreys are "fish hawks" and are never very far from lakes or etc. harboring fish. They often hunt from a perch similar to those in your pix, and similarly nest in high, bare snags, where they build a large, usually conspicuous nest platform. As birders know, what they do is often as important as how they look in identifying avifauna.

 

[tom turner]

Hi, In live in a small town of about 15,000 and yes, there are a couple of small ponds a block or two away in our neighborhood AND my yard has a small, wooded stream that passes through its border.


I'm thinking that they may be Mississippi Kites . . . another good possibility, and I hope someone can say for sure.

They are mating here right now and I hope they stick around!

 

[woodsltc]

Tom, I think you are right, your picture and description looks like a Mississippi Kite to me also. Check out the following link:

Don

Mississippi Kite, Identification, All About Birds - Cornell Lab of Ornithology

 

[DeathGrip]

The Mississippi Kite has a forked tail and gull like wings.Osprey has a flat/broad tail and thick wings like a eagle.
The Kites a built for speed and hunt in the tree tops for other birds.Around here they harass the Quaker Parrots when they nest high in the pines.

D.G.

 

[socal s&w]

I know nothing about Mississippi Kites, but it appears to me that the bird photgraphed is in the Kite family.

If it has black tipped wings, my guess would be a Black-Tip Kite. They are not common.

 

[mwtdvm]

The Kites a built for speed and hunt in the tree tops for other birds.Around here they harass the Quaker Parrots when they nest high in the pines.

D.G.

Ahh Quakers.. Peace loving non-violent types.. Preyed upon by the predatory Kites.. There ought to be a law..

Those that beat their swords into plows, plow for those who didn't...

 

[M28]

We have a lot of Osprey around this neck of the woods as they fish the lakes in the area. While I can see how someone might mistake the OP's pics for an Osprey, several characteristics suggest that it is not.

Brian~

 

[CAJUNLAWYER]

Hi,

I live in middle Georgia and we've got a pair of these things that have taken up near our home. I can't figure out what they are but they are big and have fairly long, angled (boomerang) type wings. Their sound is something like "k-ree, k-ree."
Sorry for the far away shot that had to be enlarged from my 15MP Canon DSLR (w/55 mm lens). In the tall tree tops they were quite tiny. I did use a tripod to help, and set the camera on timer mode so it wouldn't shake.

Hope someone can give me the answer!

Thanks!

Tom

PS: Twice now I've seen them BOTH together on that top limb, one on top of the other. Must be mating season.

Those m'boy are what we call birds down here. If you throw a rock at them, they will actually fly away as opposed to non birds which will just fall out of the tree.

 

[Phideaux]

Tom, it's a Mississippi Kite. Definetly not a Ospery.

 

[venomballistics]

Those m'boy are what we call birds down here. If you throw a rock at them, they will actually fly away as opposed to non birds which will just fall out of the tree.

This sir, is comic brilliance.
I finished my cup of coffee in time. My keyboard survived by a matter of seconds

 

[sipowicz]

When you don't know, shoot it and bring it to the zoo..they have experts there...