Rooiberg

Watch this space!! - 5th - 8th July

Lowveld Birding Trip

In December we went on a birding trip to Nelspruit and the surrounding areas. It was amazing, providing we saw 22 new birds we could add on our list.

We managed to take some really nice photos…

Our first stop was the Nelspruit Botanical Gardens. It was a real treat (adding: very hot and humid). In the Nelspruit Botanical Gardens, we found a pair of Blue-mantled Flycatchers nesting. Here’s a picture of the female checking on her eggs.

While walking in the gardens we also came across Green-Backed Camaroptera, Green-Browed robin-chat, Little swift and Greated striped swallow… also 4 new sightings.

We stayed at Thinus’s family on a nursery… actually it’s more like a big farm for their nurseries in Nelspruit and Hoedspruit. They have the most amazing (and bird/animal friendly) garden that I’ve ever seen! In the palms there are fruit bats sleeping during day-time and palm swifts nesting in the adjacent palm trees. Here I saw the most Lesser-striped swallows I’ve ever seen since I started up birding.The new sightings in the garden were:

Scarlet-crested sunbird, Yellow-fronted canary, Golden Weaver and Spectacled Weaver. Again I spotted the Purple-Crested Turaco again and managed to get a picture of it… just because it’s so beautiful.

On the house’s porch the lady of the house kept a large bird cage with mainly doves inside. I later noticed one Blue Waxbill flying around inside and asked her if she caught it and put it in the cage… she said that the waxbill managed to get inside the cage by itself probably wanting the food inside. While sitting outside later the day a saw another Blue Waxbill outside next to the cage on the pavement… I think she missed her partner (and maybe a bit jealous because of the free food inside) J

The one day we went fishing on a small dam on the farm where we got a fair share of birdies… one new one: Red-headed Weaver.

We visited Kruger Park Lodge the next day and walked around the river and came across a cute bird hide where we almost completed our list of kingfishers with these 2 new sightings: Striped Kingfisher and Malachite Kingfisher. Alongside the river we also spotted a Purple Heron and in a tree growing in the middle of the river an Olive Woodpecker.

The entire time of our stay there was a Red chested Cuckoo making its common sound… even in the middle of the night… crazy bird. Only Thinus could spot it… it just wouldn’t show itself to me. I’ve heard that they are very shy birds though.

The most exiting of our trip were the visit to Moholoholo Rehabilitation Centre for cheetahs, birds and other wild animals. Inside and outside were so many birds, it was difficult to establish if the birds was only there because of the free food or were ex-patients of the centre. At the reception there was a cheetah greeting us… but not as exciting as the birds of prey inside. We were led by a guide inside a cage where White-backed Vultures and Hooded Vultures are kept and rehabilitated. It was feeding time and Thinus had an opportunity to feed them under supervision of the guide of cause. They really are big birds… and quite heavy as seen on the picture. While at the waterhole where a baby hippo is kept I heard something that lead to my most exiting sighting… a Diderick Cuckoo!!!

Outside the reserve there’s several Marabou Storks and Vultures sitting in large flocks and flying around. During the tour a Yellow-billed Kite also was in the surroundings, but the guide said it was one of the birds rehabilitated there and stayed in the area.

The last night of our stay, I decided to walk around outside at sunset. While standing under a large tree (don’t ask me what… I’m into birds) a large bird came flying low and landed on one of the branches about 3 meters above my head. I stood frozen with amazement and watched the owl staring at me from its branch, probably deciding if I’m some type of overgrown mouse. We stood there, staring at each other for about 1 minute; me to afraid to lift my camera and scare it away and the owl maybe still wondering… To my disappointment, it flew off into the young night. It was truly the closest encounter I ever had with an owl and remembering its heart-shaped face (and sound later the evening), we identified it as a barn owl.

The lowveld is truly a wonderful place to go birding and there’s so much to do, you won’t go bored one day!

Our full bird list for this trip can be seen on www.thinusbotha.co.za/birdlist

The Wattled Crane

This is a posting dedicated only to one bird... the Wattled Crane. This beautiful bird are the most endangered species of crane with an approximate 250 individuals in the wild.

I went to visit Monte Casino Bird Gardens on Friday, 27 April 2007. A show was held in the amphitheater showing several birds, but one bird drew my attention.

As the guide presented their Wattled Crane, Wabbles, the song "Rose" from the movie Titanic soundtrack started to play. In came Wabbles proudly posing for the crowd with wide open wings not even knowing how special he is. As Wabbles ran up and down posing and jumping gracefully like a ballerina my heart felt so sore for this poor bird species... I wished I could reach out to them in some way and just change everything. The only thing we can do is make people aware of their crisis.

Visit www.kzncrane.co.za/wattlecrane.htm for more information

Kosi Bay & Sodwana

New bird sightings (view our complete list at www.thinusbotha.co.za/birdlist):
Since March this year we were so exited going on this trip. This was the first time we visited SA's coastal shores since we started birding and we expected lots of new sightings.

Day 1 - Kosi Bay Nature Reserve
Arriving at the reserve we were directed to the first overnight huts. Our first impression was very good. It was already late by then so we didn't see any new birds.

Day 2 - Kosi Mouth
At the reception waiting for our permits for Kosi Mouth, we got our first new sightings: the Purple-banded sunbird and the Yellow-throated longclaw. At Kosi Mouth we snorkeled the entire day seeing the most beautiful ocean fish... angle fish, domino fish, moray eels and a beautiful lion fish. Returning from the mouth we saw our first White-fronted Plover.
Day 3 - Dog Point
After unpacking at Maputaland Bush Camp, we went to relax at Dog Point the afternoon. We saw White-fronted plovers again together with the Ruddy Turnstone. These four photos are some we managed to get.

While we were relaxing on the sand and snorkeling we noted some kind of vulture or eagle souring. At first we were confused, because this bird looked very much like a Fish Eagle, but had a funny looking beak. To our great pleasure we found (after a while of searching and examining our rather bad quality photos) that it was indeed the special Palm-nut Vulture. After returning to our bush camp, we asked Willie what was his opinion and if he had seen Palm-nut Vultures at Dog's Point...and yes, he said, there were indeed two Palm-nut Vultures nesting at Dog's Point. The reason that we concluded that this was a Palm-nut Vulture, was because of the looks of it's beak, the mainly white primary wing feathers and white tips at the edge of its wings (seen in the second picture). We were very fortunate to see this amazing bird.

Day 4 - The fern/palm forest
We went to a beautiful forest the next day. This was in the same vicinity where one of the camps were from the hiking trail. In this forest we spotted two new birds... a Lizard Buzzard and a Black-crowned Tchagra... and wait for this... we even took a photo of both!
Day 5 - Black Rock
We got up early the next morning and while drinking coffee outside we saw our first Sombre Greenbul.
Later Willie took us to see the waterhole 2 km from the house where a couple of hippo's live. In the field we saw several African Wattled Lapwing and lots of LBJ's that flew around like little superbirds not giving a near glimpse for us. While one of us were wandering into the field, a Swamp (Natal) Nightjar flew up from the fright it got and flew off making this weird sound... just like a water drop. It made one large turn and settled down in the grass again. Well, everything happened so quickly that we were able to ID the nightjar only by it's sound it made while it flew away. At the hippo whole a African Jacana were present... yes Thinus were especially delighted on our first sighting of a Jacana.
After packing we went to Black Rock to spend the day. On our way there, we came across a pair of Little Bea-eaters that were attacking the Land Rover probably because their nest were nearby. This was so far the most pretty little bird I have seen on the trip... they were so determined to chase us away...

After spending the afternoon at Black Rock, we headed to Sodwana where we had a reservation at the Sodwana Bay Nature Reserve from the Thursday to Sunday. On our way to Sodwana we had 2 sightings of Crowned Hornbill.
In Sodwana we saw many birds we spotted previously, especially the Southern Boubou, Pied Wagtail and Cape Wagtail.
Over this 3 and a half days we were extra lazy... lying around on the beach, snorkeling again, playing 30 seconds and UNO and just walking in the nature reserve.
The new sightings were as follow:
In Sodwana Bay Nature Reserve -

• Yellow Weaver (no camara with us at the time)
• Purple Crested Turaco (very beautiful, but it was to quick to take a photo)
• Dark-backed Weaver (in afrikaans a "bosmusikant". I loved the beautiful sound this bird entertained us with - see photo next)
• Square-tailed Drongo
• Collard Sunbird (we saw 2 sunbirds nesting... very cute with their short beaks)
• Rudd's Apalis (this was rather a mission to find the bird making this sound... finally when we found it, it was this tiny little apalis with it's big mouth... hmm ok, beak)
• Temminck's Courser (they say this is a special bird we saw... check out these photo's)
• Broad-billed Roller (I kept this one for the last of on our list of new sightings because for me, this is a very eye catching bird... colors galore!!)

Some of the other interesting photos we took from birds we already had on our birdlist, but still is special... in one way or another:

• The Grey-headed Gull (we saw this gull at Bronkhorstspruit dam as well... these birds are just everywhere - seen at Kosi Mouth)

• Pied Wagtail... without a tail (this poor thing ran around on the Sodwana beach with it's partner and initially confused us, but very soon we realized the wagtail must have had an accident of some sort)

• Brown-Hooded Kingfisher (just because it's a great photo and who sees a kingfisher everyday? - seen near Maputaland Bush Camp)

• A collage of the common bird seen in Sodwana and Kosi Bay:

Top Left: The White-throated Robin-Chat
Top Right: Crested Guineafowl
Bottom Left: Black-backed Puffback
Bottom Right: Southern Boubou

Our full list (old and new birds for this trip was)

1. Common Fiscal
2. African Sacret Ibis
3. Egyptian Goose
4. Long-tailed Widowbird
5. Black-bellied Starling
6. Cape Turtle-Dove
7. Crowned Lapwing
8. Cattle Egret
9. Blacksmith Lapwing
10. Black-shouldered Kite
11. Pied Crow
12. Yellow-throated Longclaw
13. Fork-tailed Drongo
14. Red-winged Starling
15. Purple-banded Sunbird
16. Bronze Mannikin
17. Lesser Swamp-Warbler
18. Brown-hooded Kingfisher
19. White-throated Robin-Chat
20. Palm-nut Vulture
21. Little Bea-eater
22. Ruddy Turnstone
23. White-fronted Plover
24. Lizard Buzzard
25. Black-crowned Tchagra
26. Sombre Greenbul
27. African Wattled Lapwing
28. Spur-winged Goose
29. Black-backed Puffback
30. African Jacana
31. Crowned Hornbill
32. Swamp Nightjar
33. Crested Guineafowl
34. Laughing Dove
35. Natal Francolin
36. Hadeda Ibis
37. African Hoopoe
38. African Pied Wagtail
39. Cape Sparrow
40. Speckled Mousebird
41. Dark-capped Bulbul
42. White-breasted Cormorant
43. Rudd's Apalis
44. Collared Sunbird
45. Square-tailed Drongo
46. Dark-backed Weaver
47. Purple-crested Turaco
48. Southern Boubou
49. Temminck's Courser
50. Burchell's Coucal
51. Yellow Weaver
52. Broad-billed Roller

Lucky strike

This photo was taken at a holiday resort near Nylstroom. In the photo 3 birds (all three special because they are not very common in Pretoria) were caught at once at the same time:
The whitish bird is a Groundscraper Thrush... as the name indicate, this thrush were mostly seen running around on the large lawns of the resort. The bird just next to the thrush is a Cape Glossy Starling... very common and was seen everywhere in the resort. The bird flying was unmistakably a Fork-tailed Drongo... how can any person miss that forked tail...

Egyptian Goose (Kolgans)

Egyptian Goose (Alopochen aegyptiacus) is very common in South Africa.

This photo shown here is a goose posing for a nice photo at the Johannesburg Botanical Gardens. They appear to be very clumsy, but are still very beautiful animals. They are for sure also, like many other birds, a good example of being faithful because Egyptian Geese pair for life.

Egyptian Geese were considered sacred by the ancient Egyptians, and appeared in much of their artwork. Read more on Wikipedia

Grey-headed Bush Shrike (Spookvoel)

Every year my work organizes a weekend during which we get to know each other better and participate in competitions among each other. As for me and Thinus, we got to know our bird a bit better as well. We went to a resort called Weesgerus about 6 kilometers from Nylstoom (Modimolle).
One of our first sightings was this beautiful Grey-headed bush-shrike that caused lots of excitement. In Afrikaans it’s known as a “Spookvoël” literally translated as “Ghost bird”. It got its name because the bush-shrike’s call sounds a lot like a ghost calling.
As seen in the picture it has very good camouflage and it just make you think how many special birds could be hiding right under your nose.