On Saturday, May 11, 2019, 12:40 PM, 'chege wa kariuki' chege@birdwatchingeastafrica.com [kenyabirdsnet] <kenyabirdsnet-noreply@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
Dear birders
Some 3 days before the e-Bird’s Global Birding Day (4th May) a friend and I thought we should go to north of Garissa in search of a Collared Lark and other birds that would not be recorded by others. We were to leave afternoon of 3rd as both of us were busy but the last minute he changed his mind sighting of insecurity as a thought. So there was no way I could go up there alone. At around 6pm I decided then I would go to Mwea National Reserve and the best was to go spend the night there and have an easy start the day after. So by 7pm I was on the road. Along the way I thought may be birding this road to Garissa Town would for sure offer quite a few more super species than Mwea. Check if the Red-naped Bush Shrike are still on the road. And so I drove further spending the night at Mwingi arriving at 930pm.
Sometimes in the middle of the night something told me no….try go north of Garissa. So I woke up at 4am and left.
When the morning light was on I started birding somewhere past Bangali and Garissa. Stopping any place I thought it looked good till around noon when I arrived Garissa. Along the many stops I made the only raptors I say were 1 Black-winged Kite that I saw on my way back at the same spot, an Eastern Chanting Goshawk and 2 Pygmy Falcons. I had never seen a flock of about 40 Cut Throats before; feeding on the ground with the Red-billed Quileas. Eastern Yellow-billed Hornbill appeared almost in every small somali manyattas along the road. My first bird of the days was a Comb Duck flying alongside the car for a few seconds. Buff-crested Bustard calling from the bushes. Not far from Garissa there were quite a number of Acacia turnbulliana (which is the habitat you’d find or expect a Collared Lark) and none seen but also the soil type was softer clay and not sandy red.
Two Egyptian Geese were seen pas Garissa past the town and 2 more on a road side water pool about 70 km north of Garissa. The first flock of Vulturine Guineafowls was some 20km past Garissa on the turn off to Mado Gashe and road to Liboi about 30 birds next to a small trading centre at the junction where there were a 5 Feral Pigeons feeding by the police road block, a Cattle Egret and 1 Sacred Ibis. Mourning Collared-Dove were in good numbers but while watching one at a trading centre some 20km south of Mado Gashe dropped on the ground from a tree, kicking the legs for a few seconds and died. Talking to the local they said it’s been happening. I did pick the carcass and now it’s with the NMK’s Ornithology Department just incase they wanted to undertake some lab test.
Also were a few Ring-necked Dove and Laughing Dove compared to others while only 3 Speckled Pigeons were seen. Once in a while, while driving a Namaqua Dove or two would fly across the road and others seen on the water pools.
Was pretty dry but there were these little pockets of water pools along the road showing some signs of rains some days ago and hence some Black-faced & Chestnut-bellied Sandgrouses, 3 Wood Sandpiper, Spur-winged Lapwing and on one pool 3 marabou’s Storks. Black-headed Lapwing were seen before Garissa and after and a family of 5 with two thet looked subadults. A flock of over 100 Little Swifts at the Tana River bridge at Garissa town and quite a few African Palm-Swift. Crowned Lapwing were seen 3 times along the road and Black-headed Lapwings seemed the commonest of the genus. Blue-naped Mousebird, Von der Decken's Hornbill and few Northern Red-billed Hornbill, only a pair of Somali Bee-eaters were seen some around 80km North of Garissa.
3 late Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters were feeding by powerline before Garissa. Only 1 Lilac-breasted, 1 Eurasian & 1 Rufous-crowned Roller not far from each other were seen before Garissa town. Black-throated Barbet would call all along from Bangali all the way to my last stop which was about 15km to Madogashe. Only a pair of Cardinal Woodpecker but aA few sighting and calls of Nubian Woodpecker. Pygmy Batis were quite common by calls but had this pair of Eastern Black-headed Batis and who were singing. Brubru’scall was quite a common after every few stops but Pringle's Puffback called most places and you could hear them even when driving. Two sightings of Red-naped Bushshrike both before arriving to Garissa and on the north of Garissa. Rosy-patched Bushshrike were located only 3 times but were vocal in many places.
And so the migrants seen during the two days were 3 Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters, 1 Eurasian Roller, ½ dozen Barn Swallows, 2 Common Whitethroats, 1 Lesser Gray Shrike, 3 Wood Sandpipers, 2 Willow Warblers.
1 Taita Fiscal was seen west of Garissa and no Somali Fiscal was seen. 2 flocks of Northern White-crowned Shrike North of Garissa, Fork-tailed Drongo were common one with very pale windows on the wing and quite very short fork. Pied Crows in every other small trading centres, I think 3 groups of Chestnut-headed Sparrow-Lark, Pink-breasted Larks were very common and sang or whistled quite often. No Collared Lark was seen but I might have heard one on my way back to Garissa around 1830hrs but could not locate since it sounded far inside the bush and the sun was disappearing and I didn’t want to get lost in the bushes at that time while I was still 70km to Garissa town. While I was further north this place had some showers. So I marked the place and the following day I went back and tried calling and walking through the bushes and none was seen or heard. It was a good site Acacia turnbulliana were in numbers but without locating a single bird and they were seemed quite common and available on every trip I’ve been there including the two trip with Brian Finch and others then I doubted my single whistle I heard of the lark and pulled it out of the list
The road is now all superbly tarmacked and about to reach Mado Gashe, 1 Sombre Greenbul was singing while crossing the bridge in Garissa town. Dodson’s Bulbuls were seen but only about 3 times.
A pair of Somali Crombec were seen and located each day but quite common was Northern Crombec. I kept an eye for Phillipa’s Crombec ( a bird Brian Finch thought might be in Kenya since the distribution comes to the border of Kenya and Somali but only recorded in Somali) So I did try look and locate each crombec I would hear. Only 1 pair of Yellow-vented Eremomela were seen, a few calls of Grey Wren-Warbler while Pale Prinia were common together Red-fronted Warblers.
I somehow lost my attention of flycatchers to searching for the lark and at last can’t figure out who was commoner between the Grey and Bafirawari/Wajir Flycather but observing a few times the Wajir I realized he liked to pump up the tail to an extent like a Red-fronted Warbler or Tawny-flanked Prinia….a habit I cannot recal seeing while we were up there………..Ebird has it as a full species when logging but after it does count it as Pale Flycatcher.
White-browed Scrub Robin were as usual very common and vocal. Golden-breasted Starling weren’t as common as before and Superb Starlings were the very commonest bird to encounter. Not a single Shelly’s Starling was seen reminding me of a trip with three Swedish birders up there and Collared Lark was pretty common and singing and presumably more than 500 Shelly’s Starling in flocks of 50s. This was in Dec and the rains were good with over 100 individual Grasshopper Buzzards.
Fischer's Starling were common. Eastern Violet-backed Sunbird and Hunter's Sunbirds with White-bellied version of Variable Sunbird being commoner thank any other sunbird.
About 3 sightings of male Northern Grosbeak-Canaries. Somali Bunting.
House Sparrow were seen in Garissa and hybrid of House Sparrow and Somali at Shimbir Trading Centre. However, at least a few Somali Sparrow were present in every small trading centre and a few feeding closer to those nomadic Somali Manyattas. Atleast on the second trip with Brian Finch, Ben Mugambi, Itai Shanni among others in 2009 I cannot remember any of the Somali Sparrows and this time they were present and commoner. I bet had I checked every sparrows in Garissa there might have been some already there. Parrot-billed Sparrow were quite common in pair or 3-4 birds. Yellow-spotted Petronia, Red-billed Buffalo-Weaver seen feeding along the road and a place past Bangali where they are nesting on a pylon. White-headed Buffalo-Weaver. White-browed Sparrow-Weaver were not as common compared to other habitats they are found. Black-capped Social-Weaver were only seen on one tree where they were nest building north of Garissa. Red-billed Quelea were probably around 100 individuals.
3 pairs of Green-winged Pytilia , about 15 Gray-headed Silverbills which seems not recorded in Garissa and the east but recorded right on the border of Kenya and Somali on the Somali side.
Others birds seen after the global birding day included African Bare-eyed Thrush, Wattled Starling, Somali Tit, Abyssinian Scimitarbill, Lesser Masked Weaver, Tsavo Sunbird.
There was also a birds similar to a Northern Brownbul but wing pattern of rufous edging like a whitethroat. Could not tell what it was and never got a chance to photograph. They were two birds. Then one bird that I photographed but I cannot put a name on it. Looked size and shape like a Donaldson-Smith Sparrow-Weaver or even size of a petronia (or slightly bigger) but smaller than a buffalo weaver and Fischer’s Starling that weren’t very far., this bird once flew and patched inside the bush and came out. The bill looked strong but not as strong a buffalo-weaver and not as thin as the Fischer’s starling. Flicking the wing and the tail like a petronia on patching, all the belly, chest and throat was white and seemed to have no contrast. I had the bird for about a minute. It’s attached.
Weirdly, Desert Warthog were common in every trip I did up there but this time there was none but there were, a single Reticulated Giraffe, Gerenuk, Dikdik??????, Unstriped Ground Squirrel and a pari of African Wild Cats. For not seeing a single Collared Lark I would still be interested to go again and a bit north may be Black-billed Scimitarbill (which would be a lifer) might be present there.
Many thanks and best wishes
chege
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