Heldeberg Nature Reserve, Cape Town, South Africa

In Somerset West, nestled in the lap of the mountain, is the Heldeberg Nature Reserve. In the summer, on warm Sunday evenings, concerts are held with a band playing beneath the oaks while the audience watch with a bottle of wine and a picnic from the grassy slope. Children, not taken with the drum and bass led soft rock, played football on the grass or hide and seek in the fynbos. It is a great place to be. This was an evening visit at the end of a long day.

The birds were a little further up the slope than normal to escape the noise and excitement. A small Muscicapa showed with a short eye stripe which I thought of as a Dusky Flycatcher. When it came out for a proper view, the pale underparts and (on closer inspection) the streaked head, made me go for Spotted Flycatcher.

Fynbos is a collection of heath-type plants that make up the unique habitat of the South African Cape Region. It is extremely rich in its diversity and supports many endemics. The  Cape Sugarbird loves the proteas while the ericas are favoured by the Orange-breasted Sunbird and the Southern Double-collared Sunbird. The Malachite Sunbird ranges wider, but still favours stands of protea.

In the brackets below is my original caption for this picture and it shows the dangers of assumption.

(This Malachite Sunbird would be completely metallic green during the breeding season, but has moulted into eclipse plumage after the exertions of the southern summer. Eclipse is a dull transitional plumage worn until the bright colours re-grow).
Yes the main breeding season for birds in the southern hemisphere would be opposite to those in the North, ie southern spring equates to north autumn, but it is not as straightforward as that. The Malachite Sunbird of the south-west cape for example, breeds between May and November. In the eastern cape, the season extends from August to January and in Natal, from October to April. So if you catch me generalising so badly again, please pull me up.
As for the eclipse plumage, that is a subject that needs more looking at too.

The sugarbirds did not seem to mind the music and were to be seen in their normal haunts at the top of a protea bush. The tail feathers of the male are extremely long and susceptible to the breeze. The female is able to maintain more dignity as her shorter tail is easier to control.

A café at the reserve opens at 08.30 for breakfast and stayed open while the concert played until 19.30. Access may be gained to the reserve at any time on foot, but a barrier blocks vehicles early in the morning. Limited parking may be had just outside the gate. The trails lead high up onto the mountainside, but most of the birds can be found in the lower levels. Entrance costs RSA 15 with a vehicle.

Species seen; 14

Egyptian Goose 2, Helmeted Guineafowl 4,Ring-necked Dove 2, Cape Bulbul 2, Fiscal Flycatcher 1, Spotted Flycatcher I, African Dusky Flycatcher 3, Orange-breasted Sunbird 1, Malachite Sunbird 4, Southern Double-collared Sunbird 1, Cape White-eye 3, Cape Sugarbird 6, Pied Crow 2, Common Waxbill 1.

Heldeberg Nature Reserve, Cape Town, South Africa

Strandfontein, Cape Town, South Africa

Despite having just landed in a place described as “the fairest cape”, my first port of call was the sewage works at Strandfontein, just over the dunes from the beach road that skirts False Bay, Cape Town.

The Cape Argus, a huge cycling event, was in progress, so I had to take the long way round to get there and arrived at about 10.30.
The drive along the approach road produced some Black-necked Heron which often feed on rodents in the thick rank vegetation here.

 I usually visit Strandfontein straight from the flight and get changed out of my uniform somewhere discrete. The plane doesn’t land until about 09.00 so I have never been here early enough to have to wait for the guards to come on duty. A causeway between two deep ponds enables early birders to start before the security barrier where one is required to sign in before moving into the settling lakes. This morning Egyptian Geese, Cape Shoveler and Cape Teal were to the left with more shoveler, White-breasted Cormorants and an African Darter to the right.

Beyond the security post, directly ahead (Google Earth ref; 34 04’46”S 18 31’10”E), are the buildings and workings of the plant, to the right a small barrier allows access to the birding areas. Greater Flamingos skittered across the surface of the water to get airborne and flew between ponds mading a wonderful sight against the backdrop of the Table Mountain massif.

As often happens when I go birding straight from a flight, I get lazy. Eurasian Swallows were present in good numbers, but I stopped paying them too much attention after I had identified them to my satisfaction. I later realised that at least two of them were White-throated Swallows. The two species are superficially similar, pale beneath with windows in the tail. Female Eurasian Swallows have shorter tails and I might well have missed a lot of white-throats.

The flamingos were in most ponds in small flocks of up to 20. Most were in deep water and may even have been swimming. Only in the roosting and preening birds could the classic silhouette be seen.

The first junction is marked by a small building at the hub of a pinwheel of pans. The lakes around the hub are numbered P1 to P6 anticlockwise. The pans to the south, closest to the bay are named S1 to S8 from west to east. I turned left (south) and found a pan with Great White Pelican, and lots of Spur-winged Geese along with the flamingos, cormorants and shovelers.

I had lost track of the pan numbers by now, but stopped to watch a small flock of Ruff and compare their size with the huge Cape Gull (split from the Kelp Gull).

Then I made a foolish mistake. I turned to the east along a road running parallel to Baden Powell Drive, the R310. This took me around into the scrub and dunes behind the plant where it became difficult to turn around. I felt sure that by continuing, the road would lead back to the plant and I would be able to get back on track, but then my car sank into the soft sand. Only the causeway at the entrance has a prepared surface, the rest are gravel and sand roads. This one had me truly trapped. A Karoo Scrub-robin popped his head up to see what the swearing was about and a Jackal Buzzard that was perched nearby moved back from the tirade, but hung around to see what developed. Without letting the narrative get too dramatic, I tried and failed to dig myself out and decided that I had to find help.

The plant site had three big strong chaps to whom I will be eternally grateful. They dug and they pushed and they shook their heads. They returned to the plant for planks and levers and eventually, after much grunting in Afrikaans and revving in English, the car moved back out onto firmer ground. Thanks guys!

Following my humiliation, I reversed back to the most recent junction and noticed a Spotted Dikkop (I believe the fashion is Thick-knee these days, but I am a terrible stick-in-the-mud (or sand, whichever)) standing completely still on the corner. It waited while I took its picture, then began walking very slowly back into the thin brown vegetation at the roadside. It stopped and began to crouch. Between its legs, I noticed a single egg. The egg and the bird were perfectly camouflaged except for the dikkop’s bright yellow eye, legs and bill. I pulled back to allow it some personal space and it settled.

My wanderings had led me away from the main area of pans so I returned to the tracks more travelled and found my way blocked by a gull and tern roost on the road between P3 and P2. The works are right beside False Bay and lots of gulls are attracted here to roost away from the beach. In front of me were Hartlaub’s Gulls and Great Crested (or Swift) Terns.

To my right a much larger roost in the middle of P2 held a bigger selection as well as a Little Stint working the margins. I had to pull back and find another way round to get a better light direction on the bigger roost. There I found Sandwich Gulls, Common Terns, Cape Gulls and a couple of Common Greenshank along with more representatives of the road roosters.

Strandfontein is a popular spot for Cape Town’s birders and any that you come across are welcoming and helpful. If you wish, you may get out of your car at any time, but the birds prefer you to stay in the vehicle. If I have one piece of advice for you it would be to stick to the main roads (I am embarrassed to admit that this is the second time that I have got stuck in the sand in Cape Town). It took over two hours to get back onto firmer ground this time. Last time I was ably assisted by 12 young men from the squatter camp nearby. I have been extremely lucky in my foolishness. Baden Powell Road, the R310, runs along the north edge of False Bay towards Muizenberg. Strandfontein Road runs north from Baden Powell and the entrance to the works is through a litter-strewn approach on Zeekovlei Road at Google Earth Ref; 34 03’12”S 18 31’45”E.

Species seen; 53

Little Grebe 60, Great White Pelican 6, White-breasted Cormorant18, Long-tailed Cormorant 8, African Darter 1, Grey Heron 1, Black-headed Heron 6, Cattle Egret 45, Sacred Ibis 40, Hadada Ibis 20, Glossy Ibis 2, Greater Flamingo 200, Egyptian Goose 120, Spur-winged Goose 60, Cape Teal 60, Yellow-billed Duck 20, Red-billed Teal 25, Cape Shoveler 200, Black-shouldered Kite 2, African Marsh Harrier 1, Jackal Buzzard 2, Common Moorhen 2, Red-knobbed Coot 300, African Oystercatcher 1, Black-winged Stilt 80, Pied Avocet 400, Water Thick-knee 1, Blacksmith Lapwing 4, Common Greenshank 2, Little Stint 4, Ruff 45 ,Cape Gull 400, Hartlaub’s Gull 120, Sandwich Tern 20, Great Crested Tern 35, Common Tern 200, Speckled Pigeon 5, Red-eyed Dove 1, Ring-necked Dove 4, African Swift 60, Plain Martin 80, European Swallow 150, White-throated Swallow 2, Cape Longclaw 1, Cape Wagtail 30, Cape Bulbul 4, Cape Robin-chat 5, Karoo Scrub-robin 1, Levaillant’s Cisticola 1, Karoo Prinia 2, Pied Crow 15, Common Starling 25, Mossie 6.


Strandfontein, Cape Town, South Africa

A blowy day at Dungeness

My birdy buddie, Martin, was visiting overnight and my wife packed us off the next morning to get us out from under her feet. The weather forecast was predicting strong winds, so naturally we chose the most exposed place that we could think of. Dungeness can be a desolate and unenticing place on an overcast, cold and blowy day. It is low and flat, there is little shelter and the wind was blowing in from the sea.

We took the scenic route through Romney Marshes, stopping occasionally to see if any of the swans on the fields were straggling yellow-bills, but all we could find were the Mute Swans.

At one stop, we must have been sitting right underneath a Peregrine Falcon which we only noticed as it leapt from the telegraph pole and chased a mixed gathering of Starlings, Carrion Crows and Wood Pigeons.

A large roost of Herring Gulls, Greater and Lesser Black-backed Gulls sat back from the road on the approach road to the car park and Visitors' Centre.

On arrival, our first job was to have a cup of coffee and mull over the recent sightings on the noticeboard at the Visitors' Centre at the RSPB Reserve (Google Earth ref; 50 55' 42"N 00 56' 28"E). The glass wall of the centre looks out across a large lake and we scanned for ducks and gulls. There were Gadwall, Shoveler, Coot and mixed gulls roosting on a small sandbar. Close in, a grey bird caught my eye. Unlikely as it seemed, a Red-throated Diver was swimming by, almost under my feet. We dashed outside to gather the cameras and try to get to the first hide ahead of the bird, but it mysteriously disappeared until we found it again way across at the far (north) end of the lake. We made the decision to power through the wind and push to the furthest hide and work our way back. Dengemarsh Hide looked out over a wide area of water surrounded by reeds. Reports suggested that a Bittern may be found here, but despite scanning the phragmites from both directions, we had no luck. Cormorants were showing their breeding colours and Tufted Duck were very common here. A Marsh Harrier was hunting on the far side and cornered a couple of ducks which dived to evade the swooping raptor until it gave up.
In the fields along the path a few Curlew and Shelduck were staying low beneath the wind.
From Scott's and Makepeace Hides, I was looking at the immature gulls on the sandbar. Martin and I could not agree, so their identity remains inconclusive.

As we passed the large gull roost on the approach road on the way out, it was disturbed by a young male Marsh Harrier, who in turn was being chased by a mature female. The numbers for gulls shown below are only the birds actually identified and probably don't bear much relation to the actual numbers present which either remained unidentified, caused disagreement between Martin and me or were flying about in a cloud that precluded accurate counting.

Across the road on the ARC pit, reports included Smew. Both of us scanned back and forth without any luck in finding the tiny low-swimming sawbill. We whiled away the time looking at Pochard, Cormorant, and some distant Common Golden-eye. I had not associated the Smew with the sawbill family before, but was struck by the similarity when a single female appeared as if from nowhere and treated us to a very close approach across the front of the hide.

Tiny 'teeth' were visible at the base of the bill. She made a couple of passes and even ducked beneath the water in the reeds in front of the hide to catch sticklebacks.

Species seen; 50

Red-throated Diver 1, Little Grebe 1, Great Crested Grebe 30 Great Cormorant 35, Grey Heron 1, Little Egret 1, Mute Swan 40, Greylag Goose 32, Canada Goose 34, Common Shelduck 5, Eurasian Wigeon 50, Gadwall 12, Eurasian Teal 5, Mallard 19, Northern Shoveler 120, Common Pochard 15, Tufted Duck 120, Common Golden-eye 5, Smew 1, Eurasian Marsh Harrier 5, Common Kestrel 1, Peregrine Falcon 1, Red-legged Partridge 5, Pheasant 4, Common Moorhen 12, Common Coot 184, Northern Lapwing 40, European Curlew 25, Common Gull 18, Great Black-backed Gull 12, Herring Gull 55, Lesser Black-backed Gull 40, Black-headed Gull 8, Wood pigeon 190, Eurasian Collared Dove 12, Meadow Pipit 1, Pied Wagtail 6, Mistle Thrush 1,  Great Tit 11, Blue Tit 7, Eurasian Magpie 24, Eurasian Jackdaw 2, Rook 18, Carrion Crow 240, Common Starling 660, House Sparrow 3, Eurasian Tree Sparrow 10, Chaffinch 8, Goldfinch 3, Reed Bunting 6.

The birds from the drive in and the visit to the reserve have been entered as seperate trips on my software, but then added back together to give some very odd numbers for the list above.

Safa Park, Dubai Pt 2.

Standby always leaves me in a quandry. We have to cover for our colleagues who may be sick, or caught in traffic and take on their duty with only 45 minutes notice. Of course I have to pack for different climates and trip lengths of up to 9 days, but more to the point, which field guide do I bring? Will I need the scope?
The call came for a trip to Dubai and we arrived at the hotel there at mid-morning the next day. The Sibley guide to North America, packed in anticipation of a trip to the east coast, for the first time in its life, proved useless.

Considering the timing and the preparations I had had a chance to make (none), I opted for the easy choice of a nap and then an afternoon in Safa Park. It was a quiet visit, but still better than the thought of hanging on the telephone at an airport hotel in London.

There is a post describing the logistics and workings of the park on a previous post, 'Safa Park, Dubai.' On this occasion I was able to use the Dubai Metro which has a station called Business Bay within a 10 minute walk of Gate 5 at the park's south-east corner (Google Earth Ref; 25 10' 58"N 55 15' 02"E). I paid the required AED 3 (@ AED5 = £1) and the park was open to my watchings until 23.00.

Slender-billed Gulls are winter visitors to Dubai and I hoped that I might find one or two mixed in amongst a flock of Black-headed Gulls that were bathing on the fenced-off, bird sanctuary lake. The two species have a similar look in-flight and when in their winter plumages. The Slender-billed Gull is slightly the larger of the two and usually only has one small mark behind the eye. It is better defined than the smudgy marks of the Black-headed Gull and is often absent altogether. The bill is not actually especially slender as the name might suggest, but it is longer and darker than that of the Black-headed Gull (those of us who carry a few extra pounds are well aware of the slimming properties of dark clothing). Once the summer comes, the Slender-billed Gull stands out by maintaining its white head while the Black-headed Gull fulfils the promise of its name by developing the dark (actually brown, not black) head.

One individual struck me as strange as it flew in. It was marked with red smudges that may have been a result of staining, but the positioning of the marks made me wonder what the bird had been doing to achieve that pattern. Ideas on a postcard please.

With the two species sharing characteristics, habits and habitats, it seemed like a fair bet that there may be a few mixed in with the flock, but try as I might, I could not make a Slender-billed Gull out of any of them.

The Indian Rollers were still an obvious feature of the park, but as on the previous visit, they would not allow close approach and I had to be satisfied by admiring them from afar.

A canal, with a rocky bank on one side, runs from the waterfall to the boating lake in the centre of the park.

My previous visit had found this to be a productive spot for a few common waders. Today, it held Common Sandpiper and Red-wattled Lapwing.

In the trees surrounding the canal, I was following a few small warblers which proved to be Chiff Chaff. Relying on plumage and 'gizz' rather than than song took a little longer than it should have done until I got a good look at the dark legs in the photo below.

The green wash showed up strongly in the sunshine, but was much more muted when the bird was in shadow.

No trip to a Middle-east park would be complete without a look at the Hoopoe. There were plenty of birds around, picking in the soft turf of the communal lawns. This one flashed its erectile crest briefly as it landed.

If you are better placed than me and get more than 45 minutes to plan your trip to Dubai, may I recommend you to a site which can offer a selection of sites and advice for the region; http://www.uaebirding.com/birdingsites.html

Species seen; 21

Little Grebe 3, Little Egret 3, Eurasian Teal 5, Mallard 6, Red-wattled Lapwing 5, Common Sandpiper 3, Black-headed Gull 300, Caspian Tern 1, Eurasian Collared Dove 12, Laughing Dove 8, Rose-ringed Parakeet 4, Indian Roller 5, Eurasian Hoopoe 14, White Wagtail 8, Red-vented Bulbul 2, Song Thrush 3, Common Chiff Chaff 15, Purple Sunbird 3, House Crow 150, Common Myna 60, House Sparrow 400.

Orlando, Florida

I have been on a trip with my family to visit Orlando. It came about as a Harry Potter obssessed son needed some encouragement to work hard at school. So we went to a theme park and stood in queues all day. I managed to get away for an afternoon to "Gatorland" and enjoyed the egrets in their breeding plumage. That post has been sent to the brotherhood at 10000 Birds under the title "Getting out of line" and includes a little teaser about the winged creatures that inhabit Universal's "Islands of Adventure.™"

Many's the time that I have bemoaned the lack of a decent field guide and I must now include the Wizarding World of Harry Potter™ among the pteralogically overlooked tracts.

While JK Rowling has given descriptions of many of the wonderful creatures that inhabit the region, she has not made her guides user friendly. First of all, seven volumes is not an easy fit into a small field bag.

Secondly, she has made little or no attempt to describe juvenile or breeding appearances. If a picture paints a thousand words, Ms Rowling may have been able to reduce the size of her mighty work by including a few.

In short, I need suggestions to help me identify some of the winged  creatures that I saw. Some of them were seen beyond Harry Potter Land and thus have probably not been described by Rowling, so contributors may need to venture even further afield.

If you have any suggestions please leave them as a comment below.

If you have a latin binomial for your suggestions, even better. A suggestion was made for the creature below; Pseudanser seussii. Without a common name, it seems like a reasonable place to start.