Posted by Bryant Roberts on April 06, 2003 at 17:13:51:
Last weekend while making a quick check of the southeast corner
of Water Conservation Area 2B from the southwest corner of
Markham Park (Pranty Pg. 218) I saw something interesting; a
Snail Kite carrying small branches to a large patch of Cattails near
the levee that parallels SR 84 a little beyond the halfway point
between the first (corner) and second power poles. I returned this
morning with a scope and sat and watched for about 80 minutes
and now believe that there are at least three Snail Kite nests there.
The apparent nests are completely concealed by Cattails but I
observed one female and three adult male Snail Kites return from
hunting flights carrying what looked like shelled Apple Snail to
three separate locations in the Cattails. Each male did this at
least twice while the female remained hidden in the Cattails after one
hunting foray. The males would sit in view for a while a short
distance from the point to which they had returned, apparently
keeping watch before venturing out again to hunt. I think the Kites
are in the incubation and/or young nestling stage and barring
misfortune the feeding and rearing activity should increase greatly
and become more visible over the next few weeks. The nesting
area is far enough away from the levee so that the birds don't
appear bothered by quiet observation but are still within easy scope
range. This is an almost ideal opportunity for someone wishing to
observe nesting Snail Kites without a great deal of effort or risk to the
birds.
There are also Purple Swamp Hens apparently nesting in this
corner of the WCA, a juvenile and adult came out to the edge of
the short bullrushes a couple of hundred yards north of the kite
nesting area. About a dozen adult Purple Gallinules foraged and
fought in the water lilies east of the Cattails.