This video from Mexico says about itself:
I videoscoped this female Snail Kite Rostrhamus sociabilis. The apple snail has a hard protective disc at the opening of the shell, the Snail Kite removes this first and discards it, then proceeds to remove the snail from its shell with its deeply hooked beak.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snail_Kite
Toward the end of the clip I turned the camera 90 degrees. This was taken with a Nikon Coolpix P5100 and held to a Nikon Fieldscope II ED 82mm with a 30X wide angle eyepiece and slik tripod.
In the afternoon, from Paramaribo to the north, to the shore of the Atlantic Ocean a few miles away.
A snail kite flying overhead. A snowy egret.
A group of tree ducks, but they are captive, on a farm. A turkey vulture. A juvenile wattled jacana. A cattle egret. A monarch butterfly on its prefered flower species.
A couple of pied water-tyrants has built their nest, hanging from a plant on the bank of a ditch. This species breeds during all months of the year in Suriname. A relative of the pied water-tyrant is the white-headed marsh tyrant. A male of that species is sitting a bit further, on a pole in the ditch.
A peregrine falcon. A red-breasted blackbird on a field; another one on a fence.
We find eggs, attached to a water plant, of the snail species eaten by the snail kite: an apple snail.
Six wood storks flying overhead.
Near a Hindu crematory, we reach the muddy ocean beach. Many snowy egrets. Little blue herons. A whimbrel. A scarlet ibis, far away. Frigatebirds. Semipalmated sandpipers.
A snowy egret and a turnstone, standing together on a tree branch stuck in the muddy seawater.
A greater yellowlegs; a winter migrant from North America, like many birds here.
As we leave the shore, a yellow oriole sitting in a bush. Brown-throated parakeets.
We reach the shore again at another spot, near a Hindu temple. Four tri-colored herons. A black-bellied plover. Many semipalmated sandpipers.
In this photo released by the University of Florida’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, graduate student Chris Cattau holds shells from a native Florida apple snail (right) and a much larger invasive species, on the UF main campus on Feb. 2, 2010. Both snails are eaten by an endangered bird, the Everglades snail kite. But a UF study suggests juvenile kites may starve while trying to subsist on the hard-to-handle invasive snails: here.
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Dear Kitty. Some blog 
Semipalmated in decline – Researchers have found that Semipalmated Sandpiper Calidris pusilla has been declining in North America. In late January, a team from New Jersey Audubon Society and the Netherlands, completed field work in northern South America. Their results indicate that Semipalmated Sandpiper has declined in numbers hugely on its wintering grounds. In the 1980s, the population in South America was estimated at more than two million. The latest surveys suggest that only 400,000 now winter there. As the breeding and wintering areas have not changed, the likely reason for the decline may be found in Delaware Bay, New Jersey, USA, where Red Knots Calidris canutus have also declined due to the poor availability of Horseshoe Crab Limulus polyphemus eggs. Find out more at http://www.njaudubon.org
http://www.birdlife.org/news/news/2009/03/news_bytes_mar09_2.html
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