Common wintering of black kites (Milvus migrans migrans) in Greece, and new data on their wintering elsewhere in Europe

Abstract

Black kites of the nominal subspecies Milvus migrans migrans breed in the Western Palearctic and in Central Asia, while the European population is relatively small. The birds winter mostly in sub-Saharan Africa. Until 2000 winter observations of black kites were rare in Greece, and also within the tri-point border area of Austria, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. At that time regular wintering of black kites started there. These data and evidence from recent local literature as well as from a number of unpublished data obtained throughout European countries and reviewed in this paper corroborate the impression that numbers of black kites wintering in Europe and the whole Mediterranean area including Turkey are increasing. The reasons considered are climate warming in the area and some negative changes in sub-Saharan Africa in the traditional wintering grounds of black kites. Notes about the wintering of black/red kite hybrids are also added.