Dear All,
On the 9th December 2009, I met with Wouter Bol at the Main Entrance
to Nairobi National Park, and we went straight to the Ivory Burning
Site. There had been no local rain and although surprisingly cool for
the early morning brightened up to a very warm day. Just before
arriving we flushed a Nairobi Pipit off the road, but it flew up and
away not allowing for any view. There were over half-a-dozen
Nightingales hiding in the bushes, an acrocephalus was seen briefly in
flight but not identified, a few Tree Pipits were passing overhead and
that was really it for this site. On the back road there was a male
Namaqua Dove on the track, and a few Nightingales and a Eurasian Reed
Warbler called from inside the dense scrub. On the track towards Hyena
Dam there were the first of over a dozen Red-tailed Shrikes, and the
first of three Whinchat. Five Yellow Wagtails were with the plains
game. The dam was quiet, but the African Water Rails were quite vocal,
and the first Lesser Moorhen in the Park for several years was seen
very fleetingly. (This was found by Patrick Lhoir yesterday, and he
obtained some very nice photos). The Hyena Dam run-off had a
Yellow-billed Egret, the female Saddle-billed Stork, a Common Snipe,
three Rosy-breasted Longclaws and the only Barn Swallow of the day.
There were two Wood Sandpipers on Nagalomon Dam, but then nothing
until near Kingfisher with a juvenile Black Stork and a female-type
Pallid Harrier on the small dam, the first of eight Northern and the
first of over fifteen Isabelline Wheatears. At the picnic site there
was a pale Booted Eagle, seven Black-winged Plovers, an African Hoopoe
and a couple of Willow Warblers. On the way to Olmanyi Dam was a
female Eurasian Golden Oriole in some low acacias, and five Eurasian
Bee-eaters by the Mokoyiet River. On the inside road to Karen Primary
School Dam we had the first of four Kori Bustard, first of three
Common Kestrels, and a pair of Short-tailed Larks, the first in the
Park for several years now. The dam itself only produced singles Green
and Wood Sandpipers and a Greenshank. Back on the main road we had a
covey of five Shelley's Francolins cowering under a small shrub in an
otherwise grassless plain, and then little until Athi Dam. There were
only two adult Black-crowned Night-Herons in the roosting tree but
sheltering under it was a Red-knobbed Coot. There was a single Glossy
Ibis, single Fish and Steppe Eagles, two Pied Avocet, six Black-winged
Stilt, two Spur-winged and seven Kittlitz's Plovers, thirty Little
Stint, five Ruff, seven Marsh, two Common and a Wood Sandpiper. From
here we drove towards the Cheetah Gate, there were six Yellow-throated
Sandgrouse on the arid roadside, but near the gate the prize was only
the second ever Eurasian Hoopoe I have seen in the Park, and a few
drier country species, which included a female Marico Sunbird, a
single Speckle-fronted Weaver and five Crimson-rumped Waxbills. Also
the first of only three Spotted Flycatchers. A total of three Pied
Wheatears were along the southern road. Hippo Pools was low with one
each Green and Wood Sandpipers and a Greenshank, another African
Hoopoe, Pygmy Kingfisher, a couple of Sprossers singing, as was a
Red-faced Cisticola and a few Willow Warblers. On the ridge above here
there were a pair of Long-billed Pipits which have been scarce lately,

Below Baboon Cliffs were a pair of Mountain Wagtails, and driving
through Kisembe Forest was our only Common Buzzard of the day and a
Narina Trogon was calling. Nine Green Sandpipers were in for roosting
at Nagalomon Dam, and the final bird of the day was the first bird
with excellent views of a Nairobi Pipit in exactly the same place as
we exited via Ivory Burning Site… and out of the gate at 6-45pm.

In spite of the arid conditions, the mammal viewing was once again
exceptional. Huge numbers of common species, punctuated with five
White Rhinoceros, three Hippos at Hippo Pools and another feeding in
the evening alongside Nagalomon Dam, two Oribi near Hyena Dam, a
Steinbok near Kingfisher, five Mountain Reedbuck at their usual spot,
a scattering of Bohor Reedbuck and Bushbuck, a Serval in Athi Basin,
two Lions hunting (but missing) Zebra near Nagalomon Dam, and a
Side-striped Ground Squirrel below Baboon Cliffs.

There were some thirty Cows in Athi Basin and along the Mbagathi, and
a party of Sheep had wandered over the river at Hippo Pools.

A most enjoyable day and in spite of the dry conditions with countless
kilometres through seemingly birdless desertified plains, so many
rewards to make it worthwhile. Migrants apart from Wheatears and
Red-tailed Shrikes are in abysmal numbers.