Dear Birdnet

Nice to hear that the Plumbes had such good birding at Tiwi!

Re: Narina's Trogon - I have seen Narina's Trogon in the Shimba Hills, not in the forest where one would expect, but in short scrub near a small stream, in which lots of people were doing their washing and near human habitation. It is both surprising and elusive. On our Mombasa Birdwatch at Nguuni farm, we spent ages trying to find it in an areas of acacia where two had been seen several tims in the previous week, with absolutely no luck. Pole!  

I was both moved and impressed by the report on the Raptor conservation by Simon Thomsett, and while not being an expert on this subject, I cannot help but notice the big decline in raptor sightings, even on our Mombasa bird walks.

On our recent Mombasa Birdwatch we saw a Great Sparrowhawk, a Black Chested Snake Eagle, a Lizard Buzzard, a Palm Nut Vulture and a Black Kite.  These were all seen in the Nguu Tatu area (Atlas 102D), an area where I have been regularly birding for the last 20 years.  We felt privileged to see so many species as these days we see so few. We usually manage a Black Kite and sometimes a Palm Nut Vulture, other times a Fish Eagle but others are now rare. Regarded as a treat. In the past we hardly had a bird walk in that area without seeing Black Shouldered Kite, and Black Chested Snake Eagle was not uncommon. The latter we had not seen for 3 years (having checked records back to 01) , the last Black Shouldered Kite was April 02. Long Crested Eagle was also not uncommon. We have not had one on our list for the last two years. The area itself is little changed although perhaps under a little more population pressure,

The story of the Steppe Buzzard is very sad and one wonders how many other sad stories there are that never come to light. Doing a wetland bird count with Colin Jackson a year or so ago we witnessed "tourists" shooting ducks on the ponds around Jilore, albeit with a KWS licence. The species they were allowed to shoot was supposedly limited but they shot two Gargeneys, which were definitely not on their list, before our vey eyes.  What else gets shot either in Kenya or in the "tourists" countries of origin to replicate other "steppe buzzard" tragedies?
Marlene Reid - Mombasa


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