Brahminy Kite

The brahminy kite, or red-backed sea-eagle, is a medium-sized bird of prey, 45–51cm long with a wingspan of 109–124cm and a weight of 320–673g. Adults are rich chestnut with a white head and breast and black wing-tips, a combination that makes them easy to tell from other raptors. Juveniles are browner but paler than black kites, with shorter wings and a rounded tail. It is about the size of a black kite and flies like one on angled wings, but its tail is rounded rather than forked. Its call is a mewing keeyew (Wikipedia, general species account).

It lives mainly on coasts and around inland wetlands, where it feeds on dead fish and other prey. It builds a nest of small branches and sticks lined with leaves in a tree, often a mangrove, and shows strong site fidelity, nesting in the same area year after year. It shares its genus with the whistling kite, and four subspecies are recognised (Wikipedia, general species account).