That is the question for anyone who might know about Kestrel behavior.
This is the reason I ask.

Today I spent several morning and midday hours sitting in the shrub
steppe area of southern Yakima county trying to video local wildlife. I
was perched under sage bush on a point with a commanding view of
several square miles of Dry Creek watershed. During the first hour or
so two American Kestrels flew back and forth in front of me; sometimes
landing on a sage bush 50-100 yards below. This was not sup rising
because a week earlier I had videoed a pair of Kestrels trying to coax
two fledglings from their nest in a dead tree located on the edge of Dry
Creek about 500 yards below my current location.

About 11 AM I noticed two kestrels ( both might have been males but in
retrospect I can't be sure) engaged in a very serious aerial
confrontation about 100-200 yards in front of me. The action ended
when the pair flew below sage brush level and disappeared from view.
Unfortunately it happened so fast I could not record the activity on
tape. At this point other activities in the area distracted me and I
forgot about the Kestrels.

About two hours later I walked the area where the Kestrels had
vanished. I found one dead male surrounded by an area about two feet
across covered with small gray and tan feathers. Insects had not yet
arrived at the body which was still limp. I looked at the body to see
what may have killed it. The head, tail, wings, legs, and underside all
appeared unharmed with all feathers intact. There was a 2-3 inch long
by 1/2 inch wide open wound in the middle of the back with most of the
feathers around that area missing. The wound look like it had been
picked open. I didn't try to determine how deep the wound was.

I am positive that no other raptor visited the area anytime while I was
there. The back wound didn't look like anything a coyote would do.

So. I did not see exactly what killed the Kestrel but it most likely
died while I was in the area and not too far away. Consequently, I am
more than just a little curious.

I restate my question: Is it conceivable that the Kestrel fight I saw
might have ended up with one killing the other?

I have no recollection seeing a single Kestrel leave after the fight but
I was distracted and probably wouldn't have paid much attention as they
were around much of the time.


Puzzled
Gaylord Mink
http://www.angelfire.com/wa/minkgi