Mustafa - definitely an awesome day of birding! Interesting
you've got the Carmine Bee-eaters there - we've had a couple of
records some weeks back and nothing since here in Watamu. Wader
numbers are really building up nicely now, however though we've
not had an 'Oik' (Oystercatcher) here for a few years now...
Other news from the north coast... I was at Short Beach at the
end of the Watamu peninsula on Sunday to try and bring my atlas
card list up to at least 50 species and had a mixed flock of
Lesser Masked Weaver, Red-billed Quelea, Fire-fronted Bishop and
Black-winged Bishop - the latter two are not unique but certainly
are not common along the beach front and my first for probably at
least two years in Watamu.
Reasonable numbers of Common Tern passing Watamu right now as
well. Terns on Whale Island have finished and gone. A dire
breeding season for them in the end - I estimate probably a max of
100 chicks fledged of Roseate Terns - and actually probably more
like 70-80. Most nests were abandoned in early August. Not sure
why, but I suspect the unusually strong winds and some heavy rain
that we had around then must have hit the colony when there was
perhaps a disturbance and most nests failed.
A Rocha is pushing on with purchasing land to create the A Rocha Dakatcha Nature Reserve in Dakatcha for the Sokoke Scops Owl and Golden-rumped Sengi (Elephant-shrew). We've managed to secure c.1,000 acres now and continue to negotiate for the remaining forest which still holds the owl and sengi in that area. We've now got images of the Sengi from camera traps from three different locations as well as a number of sight records too. Probably the most surprising record for the five days we were surveying there a couple of weeks ago was a displaying Crowned Eagle - somewhere it must have a nest, but it was very high and could have come from anywhere within 10 kms probably. The forest is being cleared at a terrifying rate - comparison of satellite images from 2017 to 2019 shows large tracts of forest cleared and burnt for pineapples which are used for 3 years and abandoned for fresh forest land. It's definitely a race against time. I was also reminded how interesting it is that Dakatcha is basically a similar habitat to Arabuko-Sokoke and only c.30km north and yet there are a host of species missing - Green Barbet, Pale Batis, Forest Batis, Tiny Greenbul, Fischer's Greenbul, Terrestrial Brownbul, Dark-backed Weaver, Amani Sunbird - even Olive Sunbird we didn't see or hear once in 5 days (though it has been recorded in the IBA elsewhere). We did have daily records of Sokoke Pipit, however, but overall there is a whole suite of species that it appears the Sabaki River forms a very effective barrier to... Scope for some interesting research there!
Colin
Greetings all,
I hosted a Saturday morning birdwalk at Tiwi pond on the 28th of September. We started early at 7:30am. A flock of Northern carmine bee-eaters were the first birds we saw as we branched off the main road, with an adult feeding a young bird(pic attached). On reaching the pond, we saw it was full with water lilies and the water level was a bit higher due to a rainy week. The resident African jacana, African pygmy geese and Little grebes were the first birds we saw. The grasses close to the waters edge had quite a few common waxbills, Bronze and B&W mannikins, zanzibar bishops and pin-tailed whydahs. As we searched for the resident white-backed ducks amongst the water lilies. I spotted a smallish jacana, which at first I thought was a young African Jacana. But on closer inspection, turned out to be a Lesser Jacana!!(pic attached) We all enjoyed watching this rarity feed alone for quite a while, before it disappeared into the tall grasses. Other birds we saw were: White-faced whistling ducks, Black kite, Common and wood sandpipers, greenshanks, ringed plovers, wooly-necked storks, grey and purple herons, a painted snipe and an Immature Palm-nut vulture soaring above. The small forest patch on the far side of the pond gave us: yellow-bellied greenbuls, broadbilled roller, lizard buzzard, Little sparrowhawk, silvery-cheecked hornbills and East coast boubou.In the afternoon (around 4pm) I visited the Kongo estuary, it was full of people and I wasn't expecting to see much, I couldn't have been more wrong! Just close to the river inlet a group of small waders were resting(pic attached), they included: common and curlew sandpipers, greater and lesser sandplovers, ruddy turnstones, sanderlings. As I watched them I saw a bird with a very flappy flight, flying over me, I quickly took some shots with my camera and turned out it was a Eurasian Oystercatcher(pic attached), I had seen the last one in early 2017. I proceeded to walk towards Tiwi beach and saw another group of waders many were the same with an addition of grey plovers, whimbrels, and a Bar-tailed godwit(pic attached). Not wanting to disturb the flock I started walking back, when 2 Crab plovers flew over the surf and landed on the beach just ahead of me(pic attached).It's definitely the first time I've seen such a number of special waders pass by Diani on a busy Saturday afternoon. Sorry for such a long story, but thank you for reading it.
Mustafa Adamjee
-- ----------------------- Colin Jackson A Rocha Kenya e: colin.jackson@arocha.org t: +254 (0)722 842366