Wild Ride: Atlasing in the Mara region

It’s 05h30 and my heart is racing, my ears alert. I’ve just tried to escape a charging elephant bull on foot. While I hunker down in the bushes, listening for cracking branches or a low rumble emanating from the dense shrubs around me, I hear a Rufous-naped Lark, Tropical Boubou and a distant Schalow’s Turaco. A cacophony of 60 low-flying Grey Crowned Cranes distracts me momentarily from my potentially precarious situation. If it’s the last photograph I take, it might be worth it. When the cranes have passed I hear the roar of lions, but they are a way off. The stomach rumbling of the elephant sounds a safe distance away, so I return through the undergrowth to my companions, who are hidden at a water- hole observation point. Having witnessed the chase, it won’t be Green Sandpiper and the domestic squabbles of Egyptian Geese that they remember from this day.

Taking The Long View

Long focal lengths when photographing birds

Lessons In Lockdown Covid-19 – A Boon For Birds?

As Covid-19 lockdowns swept the world, there were numerous reports of how wildlife adapted to the new normal. Some of the more outrageous stories turned out to be as fake as a Trump White House briefing, but it was clear that with far fewer people and cars out and about, normally shy wildlife was quick to take advantage of the situation. Peter Ryan canvassed birders to try to piece together how birds responded to the unprecedented reduction in human activity.

no entry

Southern Ground-Hornbills thwarted by a terrapin shell

cavity combat

For four months we closely monitored the nest site of a pair of Southern Yellow-billed Hornbills near Brits in the North West Province.

HOT flushes

How Southern Ground-Hornbills keep their cool

all good things...

The Peninsula’s Peregrines

Sounding The Alarm

How to find Wood Owls...

Chilling In The Desert?

Pygmy Falcons Polihierax semi-torquatus are among the world’s smallest raptors.

Spot The Difference

Distinguishing Mountain and African pipits in the field Mountain and non-breeding African pipits are frustratingly difficult to separate in the field when they occur in the same area. This happens from autumn to early spring, about six to seven months of the year. During this time the lower mandible of both species, a key identification feature, is fairly similar and differentiating the species becomes very tricky.

Shrinking Returns

Long-term changes in Northern Cape coastal birds

Home On The Range?

Is the Mountain Pipit an altitudinal migrant into KwaZulu-Natal?

supernormal

Clutches in Hartlaub’s Gulls

sightings IN THE SUBREGION

Mid-January to mid-March 2020

man power

Observations of Black Coucal breeding in Mtunzini, KwaZulu-Natal

pot luck

A lid filled with water provided an ideal bath for a hot African Pygmy Kingfisher in Liuwa Plains National Park.

back off!

Korhaan confrontation

Studying The Thunderbird

While BirdLife South Africa show-cases the Southern Ground-Hornbill Bucorvus leadbeateri as its 2020 Bird of the Year, the FitzPatrick Institute celebrates two decades of studying these iconic thunderbirds.

Girl Power

Black Sparrowhawk diva

Double Take

Double-banded Coursers

Raising Lazarus

On a mission to conserve Madagascar’s rarest birds

Fetch & Carry

In early January I paid my first visit to the Addo Elephant National Park, near Port Elizabeth.

Crushing Defeat

Yellow-bellied Greenbul’s untimely end

Elevating Gamebirds

New francolin and spurfowl taxonomy

Cliff Hangers

Birds of the Augrabies Gorge

Brotherly Love

People and other great apes are known for their willingness to help others in need, even strangers. Now researchers have shown for the first time that some birds – and specifically Grey Parrots – are similarly helpful.

Message In A Bottle

Regular readers of African Birdlife will know that I am a fan of sub-Antarctic islands and that I work on plastic pollution.

Quick fix - Sapphire Coast Birding Route

Coastal forest, grasslands, estuaries, beaches and lush winding hills all promise rich pickings for birders to explore and find the birds that occupy these varied habitats.

8 Of The Best Top Birding Sites In Uganda

Best known to wildlife enthusiasts for its mountain gorillas, Uganda also ranks among Africa’s most biodiverse countries, thanks to an equatorial location at the transition of the eastern savanna, western rainforest, and northern semi-deserts.

Dying For A Drink?

Kgalagadi battlefields