Ethiopia - Black VS Yellow-billed Kite (1 Viewer)

Dear members and bird watchers!

I am presently in Ethiopia to watch birds. eBird and also Birdforum OPUS have them as the same bird.

I also use the book Birds of Horn of Africa after recommendations from one of the forum members. They list both Black and yellow-billed. PIC #1

Pic #2 Black Kite: Yellow bill with black tip and the head is lighter, almost grey on the pictures in the book

Pic #3 Yellow -billed Kite: Brown plumage and yellow bill as per pictures in the book

Pic #4 Yellow -billed Kite: In flight and (At least I see a more shallow fork tail) as mentioned that the yellow-billed Kite should have. Also greyish front of the wings and the black kite should have darker wing front

Pic #5 Black and yellow-billed (Sorry for poor quality picture) Left hand side, a black kite with bluish bill INSERT ON LEFT HAND SIDE, as on one picture on birdforum OPUS and the two birds on the right hand side is two yellow-billed

I am confused. And as I use eBird they only have Black Kite. From Wikipedia:
The yellow-billed kite (Milvus aegyptius) is the Afrotropic counterpart of the black kite (Milvus migrans), of which it is most often considered a subspecies. However, recent DNA studies suggest that the yellow-billed kite differs significantly from black kites in the Eurasian clade, and should be considered as a separate, allopatric species.

So anyone here know if my observations are correct? And am I right with my way of see the difference? I looked at pictures on Wikipedia and there are yellow-billed with greyish heads as well. Of course, it is not correct just because it is on wikipedia.

Kind regards and happy birding
Aladdin

Aladdin said:

I am confused. And as I use eBird they only have Black Kite.

Click to expand...

Go to your ebird settings, and click on 'Use IOC taxonomy' (or whatever other wording it uses) :t:

I agree with your ID's.

IOC: Yellow-billed Kite is genetically divergent and split from Black Kite (Johnson et al. 2005, Andreyenkova et al 2019; cf Brooke 1974 , Crochet 2005, Clark comments)

a few important points:
# to correctly ID Kites in Africa you first must age them, as juvenile Yellow-billed Kites have a black bill
# Black Kites at all age have an inkjet black bill and a yellow cere
# subadult Yellow Kites have a black bill with lighter culmen and or base of bill
# moult may help as different populations in Africa have different breeding times from Eurasian Kites
# as a long distance migrant Black kite has broader wing and thus a bit longer 7th finger
# sometimes behaviour may help: huge migrating flocks are probably Black

So your birds are all Yellow-billed Kites imo

pic 2: second plumage (or subadult) with bill getting lighter
pic 3: typical adults
pic 4: young adult with light bill but not lemon yellow
pic 5: left bird with lighter culmen

Nutcracker said:

Go to your ebird settings, and click on 'Use IOC taxonomy' (or whatever other wording it uses) :t:

Click to expand...

Thank you for hot tip!!

I will have a look at this. Quite a few birds from the book that I cannot find on eBird.

Kind regards and happy birding
Aladdin

tconzemi said:

IOC: Yellow-billed Kite is genetically divergent and split from Black Kite (Johnson et al. 2005, Andreyenkova et al 2019; cf Brooke 1974 , Crochet 2005, Clark comments)

a few important points:
# to correctly ID Kites in Africa you first must age them, as juvenile Yellow-billed Kites have a black bill
# Black Kites at all age have an inkjet black bill and a yellow cere
# subadult Yellow Kites have a black bill with lighter culmen and or base of bill
# moult may help as different populations in Africa have different breeding times from Eurasian Kites
# as a long distance migrant Black kite has broader wing and thus a bit longer 7th finger
# sometimes behaviour may help: huge migrating flocks are probably Black

So your birds are all Yellow-billed Kites imo

pic 2: second plumage (or subadult) with bill getting lighter
pic 3: typical adults
pic 4: young adult with light bill but not lemon yellow
pic 5: left bird with lighter culmen

Click to expand...

Thank you very much!

They are very confusing and the picture in the book, at least I see black on the bill for Black Kite and the yellow billed seems to be yellow on their pictures. But then, on internet there are all kinds of bills for the different birds. Very hard, at least for me to see the difference.

I will continue and I will see if I can get any better pictures. They are all over Ethiopia, and plenty of them.

Kind regards and happy birding
Aladdin