Hi Nate,
Thanks for sharing your day with us, it was very good reading the
success, as the habitat is so decimated compared with what it was like
ten years ago before the Maasal started selling of their vegetation to
unscrupulous charcoal harvesters.
One bird stood out from your list, where was the Bare-faced Go-Away
Bird, there is no record closer than Shompole near Natron.
Very best for now
Brian

On 2/3/17, Nate Dias offshorebirder@gmail.com [kenyabirdsnet]
<kenyabirdsnet-noreply@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
> This past Sunday I spent the cloudy morning birding along Magadi Road
> with Roger Smith and Ben Mugambi. Birding was steady and good all the
> way from Corner Baridi down to the Olepolos Cliffs.
>
> We got started at 7:15 with Yellow-rumped Seedeaters, Grey-backed
> Camaroptera, African Citril, Common House Martin and Eurasian Swifts.
> Then came Red-fronted Barbet, Red-faced Crombec and Red-throated Tit
> in quick succession. Then we enjoyed watching a female
> Scarlet-chested Sunbird gathering nesting material and taking it to
> her nest (photo attached). Other birds at our first stop included
> Yellow-breasted Apalis, Nubian Woodpecker, and Absynnian Scimitarbill.
>
> A short drive downhill brought us to a new group of birds - Variable
> Sunbird, Fork-tailed Drongo, Pied Wheatear, Yellow-bellied Eremomela,
> Northern Wheatear, and Singing Cisticola. We also saw numbers of
> Swifts and Martins swirling out over the valley - Nyanza Swifts, Palm
> Swifts, Rock Martins, and Plain Martins. Other goodies included
> Holub's Golden-Weaver, Streaky Seedeaters, Speckled Pigeons, Variable
> + Bronze Sunbirds, Lyne's (Wailing) Cisticola, Malachite Sunbird,
> Green-winged Pytilia, Willow Warbler, Long-tailed Pipit, Red-winged
> Starling, White-eyed Slaty Flycatcher, Tawny-flanked Prinia and a nice
> male Scarlet-chested Sunbird.
>
> A longer drive downhill brought us to yet another suite of birds. We
> saw Kenya Rufous Sparrows, Fawn-coloured Lark, Crowned Plovers,
> Black-billed Weaver, Bare-faced Go-away Bird, Hildebrandt's Starling,
> Grey-capped Social Weaver, Chestnut Sparrow, Vitelline Masked Weaver,
> Beautiful Sunbird, Marico Sunbird, White-bellied Canary, a small
> gathering of E. Violet-backed Sunbirds, Common Rock-Thrush, and
> Greater Blue-eared Starling.
>
> Then we drove down to the "first I-cross Road" and turned left into
> the entrance to the watercourse near the base of the Olepolos Cliffs.
> A Taita Fiscal watched things from its perch and a pair of Von der
> Decken's Hornbills flitted from bush to bush. Multiple Red-and-yellow
> Barbets were present on both sides of the dry lugga/watercourse and an
> African Hoopoe foraged on the ground nearby. Some other common birds
> were also present.
>
> Then Ben spotted a distant Martial Eagle soaring - and while scanning
> the skies further we saw a pair of Verreaux's Eagles that worked their
> way closer (photo attached).
>
> Other nice birds present were an immature Red-backed (Turkestan)
> Shrike, Slate-coloured Boubou, Spotted Morning-Thrush, Rufous-naped
> Lark, and Little Rock-Thrush. Then we had a momentary thrill with a
> Scrub-Robin we thought might be Brown-backed, but when it turned we
> saw it was a White-Browed. So it goes.
>
> At 11am we headed back to Nairobi, happy with the constant birding
> action along good old Magadi Road.
>
> Good birding,
>
> Nathan Dias
>