Dear all,

In this year "World Bird-Watch" (WBW), a group of four (Bernd de 
Bruijn, Shailesh Patel, Gert Spierenburg and myself - Itai Shanni) 
had decided to explore the area around Shimoni and also to try and 
go out for a short Pelagic expedition into the Pemba Channel.

Thanks to Pat and Mia Hemphill from Shimoni we managed to get a boat 
and go out to the Channel where an Adult Red-footed Booby (of a 
white morph) was spotted around 11 a.m. flying north very close to 
the water. The very small size, together with the complete white 
tail and no clear face markings gave no reason to replace it with 
the more "common" Masked Booby. Earlier on the boat, a group of 4 
Eurasian Oystercatcher was spotted flying South (other then these, 
the usual Roseate, Crested, Lesser-Crested, Caspian, White-cheeked 
and Common Terns were seen throughout the day).

On the same day (afternoon time) in the area around the turn-off to 
Shimoni (roughly 3 Km from the junction towards Shimoni) few 
Collared Palm Thrushes were found (we stopped counting on the 8th 
individual). On a small swamp (5Km from the Shimoni junction towards 
Lunga-Lunga) an African Marsh Harrier was spotted.

The next day (5th Oct') on the way to Lunga-Lunga (after a great 
visit to Mrima Hill IBA, where we found some of the coastal forest 
species including Plain-backed Sunbird and Forest Batis), a pair of 
African Orange-bellied Parrot was found, sitting on top of a Baobab 
tree; i am not aware of any records from the coast for this species. 

On our way back to NBi (6th), 30 Km south of Diani, a Madagascar 
Pratincole was spotted migrating south. This might be the latest 
ever this species is seen in Kenya.

Other then these unusual sightings, many Open-billed Storks, few 
Pygmy Goose, many Palm-nut Vultures, Zanzibar Red Bishops and many 
many more common coastal species.

We hope all the participants of this year WBW had as good time as we 
did in our group (the "Buffing Boobies").

All the best to you all and keep an open eye, for the migrants are 
starting to appear in good numbers.

Itai