This is the second post this week. The first was to celebrate Adrian Lombard’s 60th birthday – wishing him many more years of happy falconery!!

This post introduces two more  bird categories – Sandgrouse and Sugarbirds.

Quite different but both ideally suited to their surrounds.

Sandgrouse

They have an usual call. Their call sounds like the squeaking come high frequency squeezing of a rubber toy.  Sandgrouse fly to waterholes in flocks of 10 to 50 birds and you can hear them coming from afar. They  arrive at a similar time every morning starting at around 9h00. Burchell’s and Namaqua Sandgrouse are fairly common in Etosha and the Kalagadigadi. I have only seen double-banded Sandgrouse in Borokalalo National Park in the North West Province of South Africa and Kruger Park.

One of numerous flocks of Burchell’s Sandgrouse flying in for their morning drink at a waterhole in Etosha.

The Sandgrouse flying in from up to fifty kilometres away. They come in flocks.They drink fast and then sit in the water and shuffle allowing their breast fathers to absorb water. This water is then carried back to their chicks.

Male Burchell’s Sandgrouse taking off after drinking and loading up with water in his breast feathers.

Sandgrouse are wonderful flyers and have an amazing ability to rocket out of the water with one hell of a jump and then they are off at speed, This makes getting a decent shot tricky. You need to sit and watch which way they take-off out of the water. They give you little warning that they are about to go. It is totally absorbing trying to get decent shots of them rocketing out of the water.

Male Burchell’s Sandgrouse alerted by activity among the Cape Turtle-doves on the other side of the waterhole. This is a great place for Lanner falcons to hunt.

Sugarbirds

The second category is Sugarbirds. They look like big Sunbirds with long tails, a bit  like the Malachite and Bronze Sunbirds which also have long tails.

There are two types of Sugarbirds, but are found in different regions. The Gurney Sugarbird is found in mountainous terrain. My shot was taken at Cathedral Peak in the Drakensberg.

Gurney Sugarbird sitting on a bottlebrush flower at Cathedral Peak in the Drakensberg.

You normally see these Gurney Sugarbirds in mating pairs. The Gurney Sugarbird also looks quite different to the Cape Sugarbird. Its tail feathers are shorter and it has malar stripes on its throat and its breast and crown are a russet red colour.

This Cape Sugarbird is sitting on top of a Red Rapens Protea. It was feeding off this Protea. The Cape Sugarbird’s tail feathers are noticeably longer than those of the Gurney Sugarbird, maybe they help it balance better in the stronger winds in the Cape.

All I can tell you is that trying to photograph Sandgrouse taking off from the water hole or steadying my long lens in the Cape wind to get shots of Cape Sugarbirds is totally absorbing. Hours of endless fascination, learning and pleasure.

Cape Sugarbird sitting on a Red Rapens Protea flower.

I hope you enjoy the additions.

Helen and I are in Kruger next week, so hopefully I can show you some interesting shots from that trip.

Until then, have fun

Mike

Helen and I were invited down to the Cape to join my old ‘shamwari’ Adrian Lombard to celebrate his 60th birthday. We have been firm friends since nursery school. Adrian is an avid falconer.

This is Adrian with a juvenile Peregrine Falcon which he is training. His main bird is a Black Sparrowhawk which, to use his words, better suits his temperament!!!?!!!

Adrian lives in Noordhoek in the Western Cape where his family runs a ‘bed and breakfast’ called, not surprisingly, Hawkmere.

The iconic Red Rapens Proteas are flowering in their garden at the moment.

The Proteas attract sunbirds and sugarbirds. Of course this is an irresistable opportunity. The next shot is of a Cape Sugarbird standing in a Cape Protea flower.

Cape Sugarbird sitting on a Red Rapens Protea flower.

As is often the case in the Cape, the south-easter was blowing quite hard. This makes photographing with a long lens a touch more challenging.

Adrian is good friends with Hank Palmer who runs the Eagle Encounters at Spier Estate, outside Stellenbosch. We went to have a look around. There is a wonderful selection of birds of prey, many of which are in the process of being rehabilitated to be returned into the wild. Their rehabilitation success is around 60% – a high figures indeed. The next few shots are of birds of prey seen at Eagle Encounters.

The next shot is of a Cape Eagle Owl used in one of the displays.

It is incredible how much quieter their wings are when they push against the air compared with Hawks and Eagles.

The next shot is of a adult Martial Eagle. This is a massive Eagle, the biggest in Southern Africa.

The next shot is of a adult Jackal Buzzard flown in one of the displays. This is a beautifully coloured Buzzard.

The adult Jackal Buzzard has dark brown eyes, an unusual colour among birds of prey. This bird is so named because of its colouring is similar to that of a black-backed Jackal.

The next shot is of a adult Rock Kestrel. This is a stunning coloured Kestrel. It is different to the Lesser Kestrel because of its barred grey tail feathers and it is not uniformly brown colouring of  the Lesser Kestrel.

Helen and I had a great time celebrating your birthday Adrian – thank you my friend. We look forward to many more years of great friendship.

Best wishes

Mike

Greetings bush lovers!

It is summertime and it is hot. Just to cool things down I have introduced beaches in to the Scenes category and butterflies into the Insects category.

South Africa, Namibia and Mozambique are fortunate to have breath-takingly beautiful beaches. They are wide, clean and go for miles and away from the big cities they are quiet. I have  included some landscapes of the southern Mozambique coastline. Long standing wonderful family friends, Dave and Mon Condy, have a superb Lodge on top of the sand dunes at Ponte Malongane. The beach shots are taken around Ponte Malongane, some from their Lodge.

This is a view looking from Dave and Mon’s lodge toward the dive centre at Ponte Malongane.

The beach  goes for miles. The sand is clean and squeaky, the colour of the sea water is azzure blue in the sunshine and the temperature is hot and perfect for the beach. The breeze normally comes up in the afternoon and becomes a good time for a long walk before an ice cold drink to watch the sunset with.

The beaches along the southern Mozambique coast are just exquisite. The sand is squeaky clean, the water azzure blue and the temperature balmy.

From the lodge’s viewing deck you can see a huge sea vista looking east and the viewing deck from the other side of the lodge gives a beautiful bush view – a bit of paradise.

I have include butterflies in the Insects category.

Butterflies certainly rival birds for colour and variety. What I really like is that Lepidopertists have created some wonderful names for our butterflies.

We have Playboys, Emperors, Monarchs, Admirals and Commodores

and Guinea Fowl, Gliders and Sailers,

also Pipers, Pirates and Jokers

to Pansies, Painted Ladies, Beauties, Widows and BlackHearts,

there are also Blues, Browns, Sapphires and Coppers  – to name just a few.

They are wonderful names and can make a conversation about our winged friends very funny.

Common Vagrant feeding off a purple Statis flower.

We have had a summer where I have noticed an unusually large number of butterflies flying around. Put colourful butterflies and gorgeous bee-eaters into the mix  and you can have great fun trying to get unusual shots.

Forest Swallowtail feeding on a Bride of the Forest at Ponte Malongane.

There are more bird and mammal categories to come. I hope you find it fun scrolling through the images.

For those of my friends from afar in the northern hemisphere climes – I hope the images bring many good memories.

Have fun

Mike

Greetings bush lovers!

This week I have introduced a new mammal and bird category. The mammal category is Lechwe, to be more specific the Red Lechwe, an antelope which is found on the open floodplains of Northern Botswana from the Okavango to the Chobe. Lechwe run into water to avoid predators. They are exceptionally fast  powerful runners through shallow water.

Alarmed, this Lechwe ram races off to put some distance between him and us on an island in the Chobe River.The Lechwe females congregate in small herds usually dominated by one male.

This female Lechwe was looking intently at us from the water soaked island in the Chobe River.

The other antelope specific to Northern Botswana-Southern Zambia is the Puku which has quite a different face and is not nearly as good looking at the Lechwe – but they are for another time.

The bird category is the Lapwing family. I have included Thicknees in this grouping because you usually see them in the same places as Lapwings.

There is quite a big family of Lapwings (previously known as Plovers).Lapwings are very colourful and can be quite aggressive, dive bombing you if you get to close to their nest, which is usually on the ground and quite difficult to see.

Blacksmith Lapwing drinking from small pools of rainwater in the rocks in a river bed in Mashatu.

Very small Blacksmith Lapwing chicks along the Chobe River. If it wasn’t for the dark clay background we would not have seen them.

Long-toed Lapwings fighting – they can be very aggressive towards each other.

The Water Thicknees do no appear to be nearly so aggressive. They are usually sleeping on the side of the river bank during the day as they are nocturnal. Those big watery eyes are ideal for seeing at night. Their colouring make ideal camouflage. You often don’t see them until they move.

Water thicknees resting on the bank of the Chobe River.

The Lapwings and Thichknees kneal down in a smiliar way to storks with the knee  bending forward.

Water-thicknee drinking by scooping up the water much like an Ostrich.

I hope you liked the additions.  There is more to come next week.

I hope you get a chance to get into the bush soon – food for the soul.

Have fun

Mike