Dear All,
A beautiful morning today (19th) and apart from Eurasian Bee-eaters
which seem more numerous this year than last, there was a sign of an
arrival of migrants. So far it has just been the odd forerunner. There
were over a dozen Willow Warblers and they all seemed to be singing.
Also fresh in today were two Tree Pipits, last year they were not seen
until 5th Nov and in 2014 they first appeared on 20th Nov. “Yellow”
White-eyes were very active and feeding young but the young birds were
also feeding themselves on the Grevillea robusta nectar, as were
numerous other species, even Brown-backed Woodpeckers. The last couple
of days Chestnut Weaver flocks have been coming in or flying over.
Strangely today no Violet-backed Starlings (as yet), they have been
omnipresent the past few weeks but last year the last birds were on
24th Oct so it seems to be the time when they leave for territory as
yet unknown. Not one species of migrant raptor reported from Nairobi
yet this season!
BUT… just when I thought it was safe to go into Langata gardens and
identify White-eyes again, the nightmare continues! Attached are
images from a video I took this morning of adult feeding juveniles. I
thought they were Yellow White-eyes. If we discount what they
obviously aren’t and that is Abyssinian as eye-rings large and broken
with prominent black loral intrusion, and yellow richer not lemon
below. (There is an Abyssinian photographed in the garden in the
bottom left image). Then neither are they Kikuyu (Montane) which has a
panda face with enormous very contrasting eye-wattle more than ring,
dusky brownish-green above and dark olive-green below (I have attached
one from this garden to show how very different they are to this
bird). This then leaves us with Yellow White-eye but the eye-ring
looks a little too much for Yellow, and the yellow forehead is not
reduced to a narrow band but extends onto the crown blending
completely with the crown showing no line of separation. There is a
fourth White-eye that has not been considered in this equation, in
Kenya it is restricted to Chyulus and Ol Donyo Orok and that is Mbulu
White-eye. Mbulu was until recently a race of Kikuyu (Montane) but has
been separated, however a sympatry between the two had never been
considered or ever claimed. These breeding bird show all the Mbulu
characters, bright olive-green upperparts, yellow forehead blending
into crown with no contrast. Obvious eye-ring but nothing like Kikuyu
and all yellow not dark olive underparts. This does suggest that this
is what they are. Comments and suggestions desparately welcome!
Best to all
Brian