Big tweet

Around 1300 Thursday, we had some kind of a hawk flying over our back garden, not that much higher than the trees at the back of the back garden. Looked about the same size as a big crow.

It did not hang around, making just the one pass, but I did catch it on the monocular long enough to tweet a forked tail, something like that of the red kite illustrated left and turned up by google. Plus a flash of a reddy-brown underneath.

Given that a lot of common hawks - for example kestrels, sparrow hawks and buzzards - do not have forked tails, maybe it really was a kite. Can't remember when - if ever - I last saw such a thing.