Mac Stone
Swallow-tailed Kites
On September 12 1997, Dr. Jennifer Coulson, a scientist studying Swallow-tailed Kites for the Orleans Audubon Society, received a call that a kite had landed on a fisherman’s pogie (menhaden) boat three miles south of Morgan City in the Gulf of Mexico. The kite was severely emaciated and exhausted, barely able to lift its wings, let alone fly.
After intercepting the bird from the fisherman, Coulson spent weeks working to rebuild its strength through hydration and feedings. Once it had recovered sufficiently, she treated it for parasites with help from veterinarians. Kites, with their broad wingspans and long tail feathers, are notoriously difficult to manage in captivity. “We were at our wits end, to try to keep him from hurting himself,” she said. “He didn't break any feathers. But usually that is a problem in captivity.” Coulson noted that whenever she hears of a rehabilitator having captured a kite, she hurries to offer advice. “They are prone to breaking their long wing and tail feathers.”
Coulson, who is also a falconer, would take the kite, which she named Pogie, into an open field to exercise him. She tethered him to a long cord used in falconry called a creance. “I actually put weights on there so that it would build his flight muscles faster, because I needed to get him gone so that he wouldn't miss migration,” Coulson explained. “It was an intense rehabilitation, but he did fantastic. And when I let him go in the Honey Island Swamp, he actually took off like, straight up, and was out of sight in no time. I'm like, ‘Wow, I guess you needed to be rid of me.’ ”
“When we conserve Swallow-tailed Kite breeding habitat, we conserve an entire community of other plants and animals that depend on forested wetlands to survive, from Prothonotary Warblers and Ringed Map Turtles to green-fly orchids.” —Jennifer Coulson
Pogie’s story is only one among many remarkable experiences Coulson has had while working to conserve this rare species over the past three decades. Dramatic in appearance and lifestyle—the Swallow-tailed Kite nests in the forested wetlands of the Southeastern United States, and each year embarks on a grueling migratory journey to South America for the winter, before returning to its North American roost to breed.
The birds' imposing four-foot wingspans have given them a fearsome reputation; many people assume they are dangerous to housepets like small dogs and rabbits. But the Swallow-tailed Kite’s main diet is made up of smaller targets: insects, lizards, frogs, and small, arboreal snakes. Such misconceptions once resulted in widespread poaching—a threat compounded by extensive habitat loss spurred by the Timber Act of 1873. The treacherous nature of the kites’ annual migration across or around the Gulf of Mexico has impacted their numbers, too. This combination of factors led to a dramatic crash in the kites’ population between 1880 and 1940, particularly before the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 was passed to aid in their protection. Previously, Swallow-tailed Kites could be found nesting in twenty-one states, but by 1940, they were only present in the five Gulf Coastal states, Georgia, and South Carolina—and those populations were greatly reduced. Today, they are known to nest in eight states: Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina; with an occasional nest sighted in Arkansas. Dr. Ken Meyer of the Avian Research and Conservation Institute estimates there are probably between 15,000 and 25,000 kites remaining in the wild—enough to keep them off the Endangered or Threatened Species list, though they continue to be rare and in need of conservation.
Photo by Jennifer Coulson.
Swallow-tailed Kites
In her role as President of the Orleans Audubon Society, Coulson has led the charge in Louisiana to conserve these remarkable birds and to better understand the factors holding them back from reclaiming their former range across the country.
The birds’ distinctive appearance—they are large and stark white and black against the sky, with recognizable forked tails, lacking the fierce brow shared by most birds of prey, but with an almost dove-like face—makes the Swallow-tailed Kite a charismatic subject for conservation outreach as a whole, particularly since it focuses attention on large tracts of forested wetland, Coulson pointed out. “When we conserve Swallow-tailed Kite breeding habitat, we conserve an entire community of other plants and animals that depend on forested wetlands to survive, from Prothonotary Warblers and Ringed Map Turtles to green-fly orchids.”
A major tenet of Coulson’s work entails equipping Swallow-tailed Kites with GPS tracking devices, which help Coulson and her colleagues better understand the birds’ behavior and migratory patterns. She first started banding kites in 1993 while working for the Louisiana Nature & Science Center in New Orleans. Though Coulson requested sighting reports from the public, she only found two nests that first year—one in Pearlington, Mississippi; and another in Pearl River, Louisiana, where she banded her first two nestlings. In 1995, while teaching at Nunez Community College, she began outfitting kites with tracking devices operated by radio telemetry, then switched to GPS-enabled tracking devices in 2011. Today, she has found and monitored 736 nests, and counting.
In 1996, Coulson joined the Board of Directors of the Orleans Audubon Society (OAS) and became President in 1999.
Since 2023, the Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Program (BTNEP) has funded Coulson’s and the OAS’s Kite research in the Barataria-Terrebonne Basin, along with many other conservation projects protecting wildlife and habitat in the Basin as part of its Comprehensive Conservation Management Plan. Because Swallow-tailed Kites nest in forested wetlands—one of the defining characteristics of the Estuary Program’s range—the project is of particular importance for BTNEP, which works in tandem with Audubon to protect kites as well as their habitats.
"People protect what they care about.” —Natalie Waters
“With the Swallow-tailed Kite, it's such an iconic species, especially for the southeastern part of the United States where we find them now,” said Natalie Waters, Wildlife Conservation Coordinator for BTNEP. “It's one of those species that will literally stop you in your tracks whenever you see them. They’re such a graceful bird, they have that black and white contrast against the sky with their long, forked tail. And it's become like a flagship species for the southeastern United States.”
One of the kites Coulson is currently tracking is a bird she named “Belle River,” for its nesting location in St. Martin Parish. She first encountered the bird on July 7, 2023, after receiving a call from Rebecka and Zach Miller, residents of Bayou Pigeon, a small, unincorporated community in Iberville Parish. While out in the Atchafalaya Basin crawfishing and looking for sinker cypress, the Millers reported having discovered a roost of around a dozen kites nesting in cypress trees.
Coulson’s research depends on community members like the Millers to report sightings of the birds and their nests. Kites are often spotted soaring above forested wetland areas, or feeding on insects in flocks above a field (particularly when bush-hogging or haying are underway). Or, someone might spot a kite in the middle of the day, miles from any nesting site, hunting in a suburban backyard in the middle of a subdivision. If a kite is seen to be carrying food or nest material, Coulson requests that witnesses note the direction the bird is heading, to aid in locating the nest. Kites typically build their nests higher up than other birds of prey. The nest is usually close to the top of the tree, and constructed of lichen-covered twigs, bunch lichens, and Spanish moss. So, if you see a kite with moss in its talons, odds are likely the bird is heading to its nest, and that Coulson and her team want to hear about it. You can report sightings by calling or texting (504) 717-3544 or emailing jacoulson@aol.com; or by using a citizen scientist application like iNaturalist or eBird.
Mac Stone
Nesting Swallow-Tailed Kites
“We've gotten some just amazing, amazing responses from the community science outreach,” Coulson said. “Some people have become volunteers, or they become interns, or work for the project over the years through this community science component.”
After receiving the Millers’ tip, Coulson accompanied them to the roost. Up to her knees in mud, she set up nets, then disembarked a Great Horned Owl on a tether. The owl, a rescue bird for which Coulson holds permits to use for educational programs, cannot be released back into the wild. But as a natural predator of kite chicks, it serves as an effective lure. Belle River flew from her roost to defend it against the owl, and within minutes, she had flown into Coulson’s nets. The Millers assisted Coulson in setting nets and taking them down, and with placing a GPS-tracking device on Belle River so her movements could be monitored.
During the following several weeks, the device, which is powered by solar panels, sent Coulson and her team eight accurate GPS locations daily, plus information about Belle River’s altitude and speed. After raising two fledglings, the kite went on what Coulson chucklingly refers to as a “walkabout,” exploring her home territory of the Barataria-Terrebonne Basin—perhaps, Coulson posits, to prepare for her migration. On July 26, things got interesting—at around 2 pm, Belle River flew around twenty-two miles south to just above the Atchafalaya River’s delta. She crossed the river and continued flying southeast into Terrebonne Parish, and from there continued due south, flying nonstop day and night across the Gulf of Mexico.
The route directly over the Gulf is the most dangerous route kites take to reach South America, since it offers nowhere to land if birds become exhausted or injured. When migrants encounter adverse weather conditions, such as a spring cold front, a kite might battle a strong headwind for days, which can result in death. Longer, but safer, paths take them over land through Texas and Mexico or Florida (also relatively dangerous, as the kites must still cross a stretch of open water). All night Belle River flew above the rolling Gulf waters, veering sharply west at 4 am the following morning on July 27. Coulson thought she may have changed her mind, and decided to head west to fly over land—but at 9 am, Belle River corrected her path, and resumed her flight south, eventually arriving in Mato Grosso do Sul in Southwestern Brazil on November 9, where she spent the winter. (The writer also prefers when a rough stretch of air travel is followed with a tropical vacation. Who would have thought a rare raptor could be so relatable?)
Zach Miller
Jennifer Coulson (left) and Natalie Waters on a boat survey.
In the spring, when the time came for Belle River to return to her nest in St. Martin Parish to mate, Coulson wondered which path she would choose to navigate the Gulf. “So, it's kind of fun, we're at a crossroads there to see, what's the kite going to do? And she did the trans-Gulf route coming back,” Coulson said. “And that's what kites often want to do in the spring, because they want to get back to the breeding grounds and make sure nobody else gets their territory, you know, as soon as they can.” The stakes are high: if a kite arrives home too late, it’s possible another kite might have stolen their nest, or even their mate along with it. Coulson referenced a past instance where one kite had trouble on her return crossing the Gulf and turned back, taking a longer route through Mexico. By the time she made it back to her breeding grounds late spring, another female was on her nest, incubating eggs. “She was alarm-calling over her nest. You could see her, like, shaking in the air. She was so mad,” Coulson recalled.
Belle River’s boldness and perseverance paid off, and she again successfully crossed the Gulf from the Yucatan Peninsula to Biloxi—which took her around twenty-seven hours at roughly twenty-four miles-per-hour, totaling 636 miles.
Success stories like Belle River’s offer opportunities for the public to become invested in the larger conservation efforts by Audubon and BTNEP. “By telling her story, the public gets to follow along on her journey as she migrates and cheer her on when she reaches her wintering grounds, or when she returns to a breeding grounds in the spring right here in South Louisiana,” said Waters. “And people protect what they care about.”
Learn more about the OAS's efforts, including the Swallow-tailed Kite Project, and report kite sightings at jjaudubon.net. Keep up with Belle River and watch videos by Coulson documenting her migratory journey at youtube.com/@orleansaudubonsociety2410. You can also learn more about the Kite project and other conservation efforts supported by BTNEP at btnep.org.
