Red Kite: The Raptor That Came Back

Each major claim carries one of three labels. established means supported by primary records, official bodies or several independent reliable sources. shared means the core fact is sound but sources disagree on details, dates or interpretation. traditional means widely repeated but not traceable to a primary or independent source.

Population figures here come from the Scottish Raptor Study Group and RSPB monitoring and date from 2012 unless stated; numbers have continued to rise since. Estimates of illegal poisoning come from published research on recovered birds and are likely to be underestimates.

Lost to persecution

established In medieval Britain red kites were common, scavenging in streets and rubbish tips. As sporting estates spread in the nineteenth century, gamekeepers killed them as supposed threats to game, and collectors took their eggs and skins. By the late 1800s the kite had gone as a breeding bird from Scotland, with the last proven nest in Kintail in 1898 and a later, unconfirmed report from Glen Garry in 1917. In the UK it clung on only in a few valleys of central Wales.

shared Mark Cocker and Richard Mabey, in Birds Britannica (2005), argue that the kite was never really a bird of wild country, Scottish or otherwise. The Scottish evidence is more mixed: Sir William Jardine wrote in 1838 that north of the Forth it was common "no where more so than in the Western Highlands", and The Birds of Scotland (2007) notes that Scottish kites have rarely been seen at rubbish tips. It was a scavenger of the medieval townscape, valued for clearing refuse and resented for snatching food from the poultry yard. Its old names were "glede" or "glead", from a Saxon word for gliding, and "puttock", which one explanation derives from "poult-hawk". As towns became cleaner its usefulness faded, while the rise of partridge, pheasant and grouse shooting made every bird of prey an enemy. Its tameness and habit of scavenging made it easy to kill. On the Glen Garry estate in the Highlands keepers killed 275 kites between 1837 and 1840, a figure that shows both how common the bird had been and how quickly it was destroyed.

A nest of borrowed things

traditional Kites decorate their nests with oddments, from rags and paper to items off the washing line; Shakespeare's Autolycus warns "when the kite builds, look to lesser linen". The naturalist Seton Gordon told of a Scottish keeper who took off his socks to wade across a river and fish. When he came back for them they had gone, and they turned up later that year "forming a nice warm lining to the kite's nest". Nests of the reintroduced birds have been found to contain underwear with surprising regularity. established The habit is documented in Scotland: The Birds of Scotland (2007) cites a nest in Kenmore Wood on Loch Lomond in 1864 that contained "a pair of ragged trousers, worn stockings, and part of an old shirt".

Bringing them back

established In 1989 RSPB Scotland and the conservation agency that became Scottish Natural Heritage began reintroducing kites to Scotland, alongside a parallel project in the Chilterns in England. Young birds were collected abroad, kept in pens for a few weeks and released. Between 1989 and 1994, 93 birds from Sweden were released on the Black Isle, north of Inverness. Later releases followed at Doune, near Stirling (103 birds from eastern Germany, 1996–2001); Laurieston in Dumfries and Galloway (104 birds, 2001–05); and the outskirts of Aberdeen (101 birds, 2007–09). In all, 401 kites were released.

established By 2012 there were 214 breeding pairs in Scotland, which fledged 318 young, and the population was doubling every four to six years. The Dumfries and Galloway kites became a tourist attraction, with a Red Kite Trail and feeding station.

The poisoning problem

established The reintroduction has been badly hampered by illegal killing. Kites are scavengers and readily eat poisoned bait laid illegally for foxes and crows, as well as being targeted directly. The Black Isle population, the first released, has grown far more slowly than the Chilterns population, which started from a similar number of birds: in 2012 the Black Isle had about 52 pairs, the Chilterns 900 to 1,000. An estimated 166 Black Isle kites were illegally poisoned between 1999 and 2006, and a 2010 study concluded that differences in poisoning explain the difference in growth.

established The problem was recognised early. Ian Carter, who worked at the heart of the kite recovery programme, was quoted in Birds Britannica as saying that in Scotland poison baits were being used "almost routinely in association with management of grouse moors in some areas", and that this was the main reason the Scottish kites had not done as well as the English ones. He added that kites also die from eating rats killed by modern anticoagulant poisons. Cocker and Mabey closed their account with the hope that the kite would not become "a new symbol for a poisoned landscape".

established In 2014, 22 red kites and buzzards were found dead near Conon Bridge in Ross-shire, apparently poisoned, one of the worst wildlife crime incidents in Scotland.

The Scottish record: The Birds of Scotland (2007)

established How the kite was lost. The Scottish Ornithologists' Club's The Birds of Scotland (2007), in the species account by Duncan Orr-Ewing, puts the kite's Scottish extinction in the late nineteenth century, due mainly to sporting estates and the taxidermy trade; some birds were also killed for feathers used in salmon flies. The decline was fast. Common north of the Forth in the 1830s, the kite had largely gone from most areas in the 1860s, and by 1870 it was doubtful whether it bred in more than three counties. Orr-Ewing attributes this mainly to systematic killing by gamekeepers. W. R. P. Bourne's chapter on the early history of Scottish birds adds that in the late eighteenth century kites were regarded as unclean but useful and left alone, and that by 1825 Mull paid a bounty for them. The old Scots name gled survives in place names such as Gladhouse in Lothian and Gledsmuir in the Borders.

established The three early populations. The account gives the Black Isle releases as 93 Swedish birds in 1989–93, with the first nest fledging one young in 1992. At Doune 103 birds from eastern Germany were released in 1996–2001, and the first two pairs fledged five young in 1998. Near Castle Douglas, 100 birds, mainly from northern Scotland and southern England with six from eastern Germany, were released in 2001–04, and one pair fledged a single young in 2003. By 2004 Scotland held 60 breeding pairs and 300 to 350 birds in all. The populations were already mixing: four northern birds bred in central Scotland in 2003, and a Dumfries and Galloway bird bred there in 2004.

established Poisoning in the numbers. Radio and wing-tag data showed that at least 37.5% of the north Scotland kites (1989–2001) and 30.2% of the central Scotland kites (1996–2001) were illegally poisoned. Smaller numbers died from shooting, collisions and rodenticides, and some corpses carried high levels of lead, probably from shot in scavenged prey. The northern population stuck at about 35 pairs from 2000 to 2004 and had not recolonised Moray or southern Inverness, which Orr-Ewing blames chiefly on persecution, notably on grouse moors. The central population was growing by about 25% a year. The book's opening chapter makes the comparison with England: the Black Isle and Chilterns projects began in the same year with similar numbers, but by 2003 the Chilterns held 215 pairs and the north of Scotland 35. It puts part of the gap down to a stronger urge to wander in Scottish birds, but mostly to persecution that leaves dispersing young kites with very low survival.

established Breeding, food and wandering. Scottish kites nest mainly in Scots pine or oak and forage over farmland and moorland below about 450 m. Established pairs lay one to four eggs in early April, incubate for 31 to 32 days and fledge young seven to eight weeks later. Up to 2004 northern pairs raised 2.1 young and central pairs 1.7, which the account says compares well with the best areas in continental Europe. Prey includes rabbits, brown rats, crows, rooks and woodpigeons, and one Upper Forth nest in 2004 held 23 moles. In winter kites gather in communal roosts, one of which in Ross-shire held up to 70 in 2003. Young Scottish birds have reached Cornwall and County Cork, and two Black Isle kites went further: one was found dead near Bilbao in 1999, and another spent two years in south-east Iceland before it was oiled by fulmars, taken into care and released back on the Black Isle in March 2000.

A success, with conditions

established Black Isle communities took to the returning birds quickly. Birds Britannica illustrates the village sign at Culbokie, designed by local schoolchildren, which features a red kite.

shared The red kite's return is one of Scotland's conservation success stories, and the bird can again be seen soaring over farmland in many areas. But its uneven recovery shows that reintroduction cannot succeed where illegal persecution continues. Kites pose little or no threat to game or farming, feeding mainly on carrion and small prey.

• Red kites were once common scavengers in medieval towns.
• Scotland's first reintroduced kites came from Sweden in 1989.
• 401 kites were released in Scotland between 1989 and 2009.
• The Black Isle population has grown far more slowly than the Chilterns' because of poisoning.
• Kites feed mainly on carrion and pose little threat to game.
• Keepers on one Highland estate, Glen Garry, killed 275 red kites in about three years, between 1837 and 1840.
• Seton Gordon recorded a Scottish keeper's socks, left on a riverbank, being found later lining a kite's nest.
• The village sign at Culbokie on the Black Isle, designed by schoolchildren, features a red kite.
• By 1903 the Welsh population, the species' last British stronghold, was estimated at just five breeding pairs.
• The old Scots name for the kite, gled, survives in place names such as Gladhouse and Gledsmuir.
• A Black Isle kite spent two years in Iceland, was oiled by fulmars, and was flown home and released in 2000.

• Myth: Red kites threaten game and livestock. Kites feed mainly on carrion and small prey and pose little or no threat to game or farming. It was the rise of shooting that made them an enemy.
• Disputed: How many kites there are now. The 214 breeding pairs are a 2012 figure from Scottish Raptor Study Group and RSPB monitoring. Numbers have continued to rise since.
• Myth: The reintroduction has worked equally well everywhere. Illegal poisoning slowed the Black Isle population to 52 pairs in 2012, while the Chilterns, which began with a similar number of birds, held 900 to 1,000.
• Myth: The red kite was only ever a town scavenger in Scotland. Birds Britannica argues the kite was never really a bird of wild country, but Sir William Jardine found it very common in the Western Highlands in the 1830s, and Scottish kites have rarely been seen at rubbish tips.
• Disputed: When the Black Isle and Laurieston releases ended. Sources differ by a year or two. The Black Isle phase is given as 1989–93 or 1989–94, and the Laurieston phase as 2001–03, 2001–04 or 2001–05.
• Disputed: When the kite became extinct in Scotland. The last proven breeding was in Kintail in 1898. A pair reported nesting in Glen Garry in 1917 is a single unconfirmed report.