o them by the adults. These insects, recovered from beneath the
perches, were the basis for all specific and generic determinations;
other material was determinable only to order or to family.

One of the most significant outcomes of the examination of pellets was
the finding that vertebrates were scarcely, if at all, represented in
the food. Three pellets contained shreds that seemed to be mammal
hairs, but in the absence of other remains, the diagnosis is somewhat
doubtful. Many species of small mammals, birds, reptiles and
amphibians were common in the Park or its vicinity, but insects made
up nearly all the recorded prey. Audubon (1840:73) mentioned lizards
and small snakes in the food and gave a dramatic but perhaps
imaginative account of a kite swooping and snatching a lizard (anole)
from the topmost branch of a tree. Goss (1891:251) stated: "I have
seen them swoop down, and, with their claws, snatch lizards from the
ground, rocks and old logs, sometimes stopping to eat them, but, as a
rule, feeding on the wing." Bendire (1892:179) stated that the food
was mostly insects "probably varied with a diet of small rodents,
lizards and snakes." Wayne (1910:71) stated that the food consisted
almost entirely of insects and lizards. Bent (1936:67-68), after
stating that small snakes, lizards and frogs were sometimes taken,
cited a statement in the notes of G. W. Stevens that the latter had
found the remains of toads, mice and young rabbits in nests with
young. However, Sutton (_op. cit._:51) in a detailed analysis of the
stomach contents of 16 kites in Oklahoma, found only insects and
remains of one small fish among a total of 358 prey items. Predation
on vertebrates must be rare, and perhaps requires further verification
in view of the rather vague character of the records so far published.

The following list includes both the prey found beneath perches of
fledglings and that identified from pellets, the latter mostly from
adult kites.

coleopteran
unspecified 187
carabid 39
cicindelid
unspecified 18
_Cicindela_ sp. 2
hydrophilid
unspecified 18
_Hydrous_ sp. 1
scarabaeid
unspecified 1
_Canthon_ sp. 3
silphid
_Necrophorus_ sp.