This bird’s common name may have come from the 1800s, when Europeans first spotted these birds. Back then, male secretaries wore gray tailcoats and dark knee-length pants. They also used goose-quill pens that they carried behind their ears. This long-legged bird shares many of these same physical features! Secretary birds are distantly related to buzzards, vultures, harriers, and kites. But unlike their raptor cousins, secretary birds spend most of their time on the ground, where they flush out insects, small mammals, and even snakes from the grass to eat.