Birding Tsavo West NP

This long post is dedicated to my dear friend Thomas Krumenacker, whom I am doing my best not to disappoint...

During the week of ringing at Ngulia, we had most of the afternoons free for Safari birding in the park. Tsavo West is a true birding national park, as it has much less game observable compared to other NP's in Kenya like Masai Mara. This is because the park is covered in dense bush, that makes spotting wildlife very difficult. But birding was excellent, with a great variety of species. Most of the birding is done from the vehicle of course, with a few specific spots where walking is permitted.

Unfortunately, weather was pretty bad for photography during most of our stay - rainy and cloudy. That's why I have so few (dark) images, and the background is so lush green, which is quite unusual for the semi-arid Tsavo West. So here we go:

Quite close to the lodge a pair of Wahlberg's Eagles held territory, and this was their favorite perching tree. Here one of the pair is being mobbed by a Northern White-headed Shrike:

White-winged Widows are very common in the grassy bits of the park:

Red-and-Yellow Barbets are pretty birds! This one posed nicely in the rare golden afternoon sun:

Any casual drive through the park produces millions of weavers, starlings and finches. Among the more local species were these Black-headed Social Weavers:

Rodents and reptiles must have a hard life in the park, as predators are perched on almost every bush. Pale Chanting Goshawk is the commonest raptor in the park:

Long-tailed Fiscals are very obvious, perched high on top of bushes:

Apart for offering very good birding, Tsavo West is simply beautiful! This is the view out of my room window:

This is my gang birding out of the car while I was being a bad boy:

And Ron giving a detailed description of we he had just seen. By the hand movement I can guess it was a rhino:

One amazing thing about Africa is that birds are often so tame there. Our jeep had a hole in the exhaust pipe the size of a tennis ball. One of the park rangers said he could hear us approaching from 10 kms away... But still birds were totally oblivious towards us. Here are a few close-ups. First, a male Golden Pipit that appeared in one of my earlier post, one of the better passerines in this part of the world. Note the moulted mantle feathers, contrasting to the older scapulars:

In Israel they're so shy! In Africa they are so tame, and common too. On some days we witnessed active migration of hundreds of these guys.

Eurasian Roller

These are among the commonest birds in the park, but a close-up reveals how stunning they are:

Yellow-necked Spurfowl

In the slightly more arid and open parts of the park we encountered Seceretarybirds, or as Jonathan described them well "vulture-stork-eagle-heron-something":

Despite the thick cover, we found some Hartlaub's, Black-bellied and Crested Bustards.

Black-bellied Bustard

Crested Bustard

And we had also a few encounters with Black-faced Sandgrouse. The red soil is just fantastic!

Even though the whole park was very wet with water puddles everywhere, permanent water sources were very attractive. The pools along Rhino Valley offered the best birding in the park. The had many kingfishers, crakes and many water-related passerines. A selection of Palaearctic waders added volume to our list, and besides them we had this couple of Water Dikkops:

Grey-headed Kingfisher was the commonest among the four species we had:

This Tawny Eagle sat very close to us:

Even the tiny pool at the lodge attracted many birds. On our first day this Hamerkop arrived, and enjoyed the many tadpoles in the small pool:

This is a crop of the above image, showing the last seconds in the life of a tadpole that will never metamorphose into a frog:

Mzima Springs, in the south of the park, are an important water source for the human population of SE Kenya. But at the source, a beautiful aquatic habitat is well preserved, and holds a large variety of mammals and birds. African Golden Weavers were building their nests above the water:

And we had close views of African Darter:

And Long-tailed Cormorant:

A small group of Vervet Monkeys accompanied us during our walk at the springs:

This lactating baby had a nasty-looking sore on its shoulder:

Birding at Mzima Springs:

And just a few more animals of the park. Tsavo West is known for its Leopards, and indeed we had daily encounters with these majestic stalkers; often too brief and too dark, but always breathtaking:

This is a Gemsbok, a large Oryx-like antelope:

Red-headed Rock Agamas are very common everywhere:

And of course, Elephants, always amusing until they charge at your vehicle:

Ringing at Ngulia

Ngulia lodge, in Tsavo West NP, is probably one of the best ringing sites in the world. At least in terms of volume, it must be the busiest. The main story there is of course the huge migration of Palaearctic species, that during specific weather and moon conditions get attracted to the lodge's lights in their (tens of?) thousands. Most of this ringing takes place at night and during the first hour of the morning. But during the rest of the morning, a steady flow of Afrotropic species arrives at the ringing tables. During my stay I never sat at the 'Afro table' and was always busy processing the migrants, but still I managed to get some images of the more attractive Afro species. Many of them perform intra-African migration, and it is very interesting to study these little known species. Ageing them is especially challenging, as breeding seasons close to the equator are much more flexible, and ageing birds according to a calendaric date is pointless.

Anyway, here's a small selection of what we had during my stay.

First, a female African Paradise Flycatcher, that are quite common in the park:

One of the better birds we had was this pretty male Somali Golden-breasted Bunting:

Another good bird was this Lesser Honeyguide, but it was a nightmare to photograph:

Blue-capped Cordon-blue's are quite common in the park, but are amazing birds to ring, almost too pretty to be true:

Another sweet little finch trapped in some numbers was Crimson-rumped Waxbill:

The poolside at Ngulia is probably one of the most beautiful ringing sites in the world. This is the view of Tsavo West NP from the ringing tables:

With the occasional distraction slowing down the ringing speed, such as a Verraux's Eagle flying past or this Bateleur that had a nest very close below us:

D'Arnaud's Barbets are very charismatic species:

Yotam and Ora couldn't resist photographing this guy either:

Harlequin Quails are intra-African migrants and were caught in large numbers both at night and during the day. The males are terrific birds:

This years' session was very good for nightjars, with 63 individuals of four species (thanks David for the totals!). This is the commonest species - Donaldson's Smith's Nightjar:

As mentioned above, the main work at Ngulia involves monitoring migrants. The main three species are Marsh Warbler (AP, or HP according to Jonathan), Thrush Nightingale or Sprosser, and Common Whithethroats that can be a headache to age. This is what we were hoping for during the first three nights, and happened only on the fourth night - massive ringing:

Basra Reed Warblers are globally endangered, and it was great to study them in good numbers at Ngulia:

On our last morning at Ngulia we caught a couple of Rock Thrushes. They are quite common down in the Plains, but apparently few climb up the mountain to the lodge:

More shorebirds at Mida Creek

As I mentioned in my previous post, Mida Creek hosts a terrific variety of wintering shorebirds. Unfortunately, after three nights of ringing many of them had rings on which wasn't good for photography. All images were taken during my rather unsuccessfull photography session.

Terek Sandpiper is the third commonest species after curlew sand and Little Stint. They are really sweet and have a unique feeding behavior, running fast and skimming the surface for flies.

This brave terek went for a large crab. Here it is struggling to pull it out of its burrow:

And here it goes down the throat:

Trio - terek, Lesser Sand-plover, terek:

Both sandplovers are present in large numbers. Among the lessers we identified both atrifrons and mongolus in the hand, but I think that identifying them in the field in winter plumage is impossible.

Lesser Sand-plover

Greater Sand-plover

Eurasian Curlew

Grey Plover

Crab Plovers of Mida Creek

Got back home on Sunday, but my computer crashed and got fixed only yesterday. So in the next few days or weeks I will upload more images from my Kenya trip. Or at least until I get permission to leave the house and get some fresh stuff from the field...

Undoubtedly one of the highlights of my trip was watching Crab Plovers at Mida Creek on the Indian Ocean coast, south of Malindi. The tidal mudflats of Mida are a fantastic site for shorebirds, hosting many thousands of birds of many species. Most are Palaearctic migrants (mainly Curlew Sand, Little Stint, Lesser, Mongolian and Greater Sand-plovers, Whimbrel and Grey Plover) but there are some local species too - White-fronted and Three-banded Plovers. The setting is beautiful - white sand, mangroves flank the mudflats, and coconut trees add an extra dimension to the skyline. Fishing is an important economic force there, and the estuary is dotted with small fishing boats. Fishermen walking across the mud provide fine photographic opportunities, that I didn't use. Thanks Ron for the image!

The local community of Mida Creek developed, with the support of A-Rocha Kenya, a system of hides and boardwalks that offers great views of the shorebirds at high tide. Unfortunately I was always busy at high tides so my chance for photography was only at low tide when the birds are scattered all over the estuary.

The Crab Plovers at Mida Creek breed farther north up the Indian Ocean coast or even on the Red Sea coast or across the other side of the ocean - nobody knows yet. But between October and March, Mida Creek is probably the best place in the world to watch this carismatic species. I estimated some 300 birds just on my section of the estuary. This year Colin Jackson and his team started sticking colour rings on them, so hopefully they should get some recoveries from other countries within a few years.

On my last morning there at last I had some time for photographing the plovers and the other shorebirds. The hide worked quite well, but each time things started to look good by my tent and birds got close enough a fisherman walked by and flushed everything - classic! So my results are not the best as they are all large crops. But I think they give the impression of this unique and beautiful plover and of its behaviour, and the beauty of the site.

Thanks Ron!