– life – bokdrols of wisdom –
There’s a beautiful patch of coastal forest left in Durban, hanging on as development happens all around it. Strolling around in the forest and on the fringe with sister Sheila and friend Jules, we heard a host of birds n paddas, saw a few and took pics of those plants and creatures that would sit still.
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Next visit we walked through the forest to the deck overlooking the river.
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Useful to top up your salt intake every so often by sticking your tongue in your nostril. Must practice that.
Mpila camp’s ‘safari tents’ are great. Comfy with all modcons, own kitchen and en-suite semi-outdoor bathroom. It’s walled in with reeds, like the kitchen wall you see here, but only to shoulder height – above that, it’s open to the outdoors under the big canvas roof. It’s a treat. A Purple-banded Sunbird sang to me as I showered. No pictures.
While photographing these ‘acacia’ flowers (must get the real name – maybe Senegalia?) this biggish weevil or snout beetle dropped into my hand. I’ll ask iNaturalist.org to identify both the plant and its weevil. Otherwise it would be like I saw no weevil.
There you go! iNaturalist.org says it’s a Foppish Weevil Polyclaeis equestris. Is it English then? Kidding!
A slender mongoose made a breakfast appearance at a waterhole. If anything was nesting in there, they were egg and toast, as she inspected every nook and cranny.
Driving along, an oft-heard sound and a not-often-seen sighting:
At the hide (must add the name – Bhejane?) I saw the lovely Mocking Cliff Chat, Lesser Striped Swallows, Village Weavers building nests and a Hadeda Ibis pulling down their new nests around its nest! A Diederik Cuckoo was calling, probably waiting to get into those weaver nests. This hide looks out over a waterfall – dry today:
At another waterhole a bird flew past as my little Canon snapped a 3-shot burst:
I took a new route home, exiting the Cengeni gate in the south-west of the park and heading for Ulundi, Melmoth and Eshowe. Right outside the gate exiting the Umfolozi Big Five Game Reserve there’s this puzzling sign:
I asked the man at the gate, How far to Ulundi? 37km. I asked him, And how is the road? and he got all coy, hummed and hah’d a bit, then blurted, “but it is a tar road.” It wasn’t too bad. A fairly normal look-sharp neglected tar road as we’re used to.
If I still had Marguerite Poland’s book on the isiZulu descriptive names of Nguni cattle I’d tell you how this beast on the way to Ulundi would be described:
I’ll go back to Mfolosi. Soon, though. Before it also loses all its grasslands to bush encroachment.
~~o00o~~
Gone.
I enjoyed my stay in Hluhluwe. I stayed in Hilltop camp in the old rondawels that were built in the fifties or sixties. About sixty years ago.
They’re very comfy now, with a ceiling fan, big cupboard, fridge, cutlery and crockery and cooking utensils, power points, lights, washbasin with hot water, kettle. And aircon. The bed linen was luxurious, fresh and clean and seemed brand new. The kitchen and ablution building is shared by all. The shower had hot water.
I spent both days there in the camp, no driving. The bushy hills where once there was grassland is not a good sight, so I elected to walk the camp forest – much of which was also once grassland!
Top right the Tassleberry tree has the most tassles I ever saw. Bottom right the Grewia shows why its called a crossberry. Click on them for a better look.
A beautiful old paperbark Commiphora had an interesting hole-in-the-bole, so I zoomed in: Bees, honeycombs and a butterfly that went back again and again despite the bees buzzing her.
Some flowers I lazily havent yet identified:
As I said, I enjoyed Hluhluwe, but I don’t think I’ll go back in a hurry. The disappearance of the grasslands ruins it for me. I wonder if there’s an eco management plan for Hluhluwe?
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Lovely three nights solo in Mantuma Camp at Mkhuze game reserve in Zululand. Nothing much happened, animals were not plentiful, the grasslands are still sadly bush-encroached, but the birds, insects and plants more than made up for that.
Driving in, I see Malibali hide is CLOSED!! Aaargh! One of the MAIN reasons I came to Mkhuze! Grrr!
So as not to moan about Homo sapiens urbanensis polluting the lovely Masinga hide with farting, phone calls, smoking and loud shutter clicks of cameras with more computing power than their owners, I have politely refrained from commenting, and instead played some games with the pictures I took with my phone and my lovely pocket Canon SX620hs. Enjoy!
In camp I went looking for cicadas. A big old Albizia tree was humming with the critters, must be hundreds, I thought. I bekruip’d and approached and searched. Suddenly the nearest one stut-tut-tuttered to a halt. And there was silence! All that eardrum-vibrating noise was ONE cicada! Amazing. I tried another tree, same thing. Could that be? I searched every trunk branch and twig around where he was calling. Couldn’t spot him.
For sundowner, off to Nsumo pan, a glass of chilled white wine on the banks. Lovely Woodland Kingfisher giving his loud kip-terrr. Heard a black-bellied bustard in the grass close by – aark like a frog, then or-wip! – but couldn’t spot him.
At last an ele in Mkhuze! I was beginning in the last few years to think there weren’t any left. There must be very few, anyway. He’s in the camp area, so one of the staff sent him running. I don’t think there’s a good story of Mkhuze and eles, somehow.
At Kumahlala hide, after an hour of being alone and quiet, the Foam Nest Frogs Chiromantis xerampelina started up a chorus, probly thinking “the coast is clear, boys!” It took a while, but I found one up on a twig just outside the hide and got a pic of him. I wish I had thought to tape their call – a lovely loud chorus – I’d guess about four of them doing a fine barbershop quartet! I was so busy searching and then clicking, I didn’t think of recording them! Here’s a shy soloist:
A family came in with a young kid carrying the big fancy camera. I was able to show him the frog. He took 45 pics with loud clicks and showed me his results. None of them as good as my pic with my little Canon!
After they had left, I heard a new sound, Hey! That’s new. What’s that?
I found a new frog! I went through my frog calls: A Rhythmic Caco – Cacosternum rythmum. I must look for a picture of one. I would not be able to see him in the flooded grass in the waterhole, confined as I am to the hide; also, he’s little over a centimetre long. Another name for Cacos is Dainty Frogs. I think we miss a lot by being noisy and impatient. If I’d left the hide after 45mins – way longer than we usually can sit still – I’d have missed these fine choristers.
Sunset at Masinga Waterhole: The sun sets behind the big old Boerbean tree that was probably already there when I first visited ‘Mkuzi’ in 1965. The hide wasn’t here then. The famous Bube hide was the ‘in place’ then, just a few hundred metres away (north, I think).
Driving out of the park to go home, a savannah scene in one of the few remaining open areas: Stripes and horns and a few egrets hanging around, hoping for some disturbance to happen. I ‘shopped’ the lily (Crinum stuhlmanii?) into the foreground, as it was lonely in its own picture with nothing around it. And it was nearby . .
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As a family we usually took one of the lovely big chalets in Mantuma main camp, but I don’t need that this time, so I choose a small squaredawel Number 1. About R540 a night pensioner price. The two ladies in reception are very friendly, helpful and welcoming.
For supper I braai a picanha, potato and garlic bread. Delish. A lovely sunset and an electric storm that moved north as I braai’d. Thunderbolt and lightning, Not at all frightening, Mama Mia. A few drops of rain for a few minutes.
(Back at home, Tommy got vaccinated YAY! and AT LAST!)
Breakfast picanha and garlic bread and coffee.
Windy, so I stayed in camp in pm. Lots of Violet-backed starlings all over. One performing at a hole in a tree trunk.
Supper the leftover picanha with bubble n squeak.
Back in camp breakfast of fried egg, bacon, bread and coffee.
Last night: Too lazy to go to the communal kitchen to cook, so tonic water and fresh lemon juice, potato salad and a dark choc KitKat.
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Seen at Masinga hide: Rhino, giraffe, zebra, wildebeast, kudu, impala, nyala, warthog, terrapins. and lots of birds too. A namaqua dove female was good; melba finch, firefinch redbilled and African; Egyptian geese with 4 babies; lots and LOTS of doves (Emerald spot, Cape, Red-eyed, Laughing), was hoping for a raptor swoop. Heard 6 cuckoos, only saw the red-chested (also Jacobin, Klaas, Diderik, Emerald, Black). Heard 3 Bush Shrike, saw none (Grey-headed, Gorgeous, Orange-breasted). Peckers, one wood, lots of ox. Wahlberg’s eagle. Purple Turaco, Three-banded Plover, Paradise Flycatcher, and Whydah (longtailed), pintailed Whydah too. Quelea, and a Lark-like Bunting.
Birds at Kumahlala hide: White-browed Scrub robin, Crowned eagle, Crowned hornbill, Trumpeter Hornbill, one knob-billed duck male flying.
The big old album is hitting the recycling bin. I have recorded all the pictures.
Home after our lo-ong honeymoon and some surprise welcomes:
Also in 1988 we had a big optometry conference in Durban. As part of the hosting committee I produced a daily newsletter. Then I became president of the optometric association at the end of the conference.
Friends at the conference – and an induction (Brauer says they induced me):
I dragged some non-canoeing friends out to the Umgeni Valley. I wanted to see the valley for a last time before Inanda Dam drowned it forever. The river was rather shallow – um, VERY shallow! We dragged for miles!
We visited the folks in Harrismith, clambered the slopes of Platberg and sang around the piano:
Bernie & Karen Garcin got married in Empangeni – George Stainton and I were his best men.
In between all the scurrying we lived in our lovely Whittington Court one-bedroom apartment in Marriott Road, and I think I occasionally did a bit of work. Sheila reminded me that she lived there for two years after we bought our house in Westville.
Another of our frequest visits to Hella Hella. And a visit to the Hills on Melrose farm, Mid Illovo.
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I gave a talk in the Kruger Park once called The Art of the Game Drive. It was magnificent, complete with exciting sightings and livestreaming. Pity was, I had an unappreciative audience. Well, they were from behind the boerewors curtain, so . . you know how they are.
It almost sounded like they had a pet monkey with them, as they kept muttering Ari Aap as I drove them serenely in quiet splendour and exquisite comfort in my VW Kombi 2,1 in subtle camouflage blue and white. But you won’t believe this, when I stopped to examine old poo there was audible sighing. Philistines. The talks are still wildly popular, but I notice none of that particular batch were ever repeat guests. And I mainly have repeat guests. *
*Like Jessie. She has been a repeat guest dozens – scores – of times. She can appreciate the Art of the Game Drive. ‘Specially if she has her phone, her music and noise-cancelling earphones with her.
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(A re-post with added pictures, as I throw out paper photo albums after copying and uploading. Major un-cluttering happening as I prepare my home for the past sixteen years for sale. Next chapter about to begin!)
Another trip to the Delta!
Aitch and I flew from Maun to Xudum in August 2001 when Janet & Duncan were helping Landela Safaris run their show. We landed on the nearby bush strip. We had been before, in January 2000. This post has pictures from both trips.
After a few days in camp they had business in Maun and we accompanied them on the drive out of the Delta to Maun in the Land Cruiser. Rickety bridges, deep water crossings with water washing over the bonnet onto the windscreen.
On the drive back to camp after the day in the big smoke of the metropolis of Maun we entered a Tamboti grove and saw two leopard cubs in the road. They split and ran off to left and right, then ran alongside of us on either side for a minute calling to each other before we moved off and let them be.
We enjoyed mekoro trips, game drives & walks and afternoon boat trips stretching into evenings watching the sunset from the boat while fishing for silver catfish or silvertooth barbel – I forget what they called them. Later, wading in thigh-deep water sorting out the pumps, earning my keep as a guest of the lodge managers. Only afterwards did I think hmm, crocs.
Visited Rann’s camp for lunch where Keith and Angie Rowles were our hosts. That’s where we first heard the now-common salute before starting a meal: “Born Up a Tree.”
Janet moved us from camp to camp as guests arrive, filling in where there were gaps in other camps. We transferred by boat, mekoro or 4X4 vehicle. One night we stayed in a tree house in Little Xudum camp.
Lazy days in camp drinking G&T’s
Here’s Trish’s paper album – photographed and discarded:
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Later Xudum was taken over by super-luxury company ‘&Beyond.’ OTT luxury, and R15 000 per person per night! Very different to the lovely rustic – but still luxurious – tented camp it was when we were there. Should ‘conservationists’ really be using miles of glass and wooden decking and flooring in the bush!? Methinks rich spoilt children are doing the designing for Daddy’s company and perspective has flown out the canvas-zip window and crashed into the plate glass floor-length picture window.
In May 2019 it burnt down. Had it been rustic there’d have been less pollution from the fire and the rebuild, methinks.
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Here’s hoping the Black Flycatchers breed on the old stoep again, Last time was in a cycling helmet; before that in the bougainvillea creeper that has been removed. This time a plastic flower pot modified and mounted for the purpose.
They have filled the pot with nesting material and the female is starting to spend more time in it. She’s there in the the top right close-up pic, you can just see her tail.
Here are the nests from years gone by, in the creeper and in the helmet:
That’s different, I thought. Something had zoomed into the Albizia at speed and the birds had scattered.
A juvenile Little Sparrowhawk. She sat for a while peering around and up and down intently. To me it looked like she was on the hunt. Then she darted off in a flash. I hope she got something to eat.
Meanwhile the Hadeda was unfazed, gathering nesting material.
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Spring birding has been great. Some poor but fun pics of what’s been buzzing about.
Above: Cape White-eye and African Firefinch – Spectacled Weaver – Olive Thrush
Below: A Pegesimallus robber fly; The tail hanging down from the branch? A vervet monkey; Temnora marginata (a sphinx moth); Ceryx fulvescens (yellow sleeved maiden moth); and – the white moth possibly a citrus looper? Thanks, iNaturalist.org for help with identification.
The female Black Cuckooshrike returned and I got a better view. Pics are poor as I took them through my dirty window rather than open up and spook her. One bird, I compiled this montage with FastStone again.
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Blustery day with a warm wind after the cold of the last few days. Rather unpleasant outside, so I sat in the lounge and re-read my Damon Runyon.
What’s that in the birdbath copse? Just Cape White-eyes. And that? Ah, a Yellow-bellied Greenbul in the afternoon sunlight. I took a couple shots for the record with my little Canon compact with its lovely 25X zoom.
What’s that behind him? Two canaries, No, next to them. A mannikin. Now two of them. Wait, they look bigger. Thank goodness for my binocs. I’m sure . . . I’m not twitching, am I?
Must take pics. One from the lounge with the little Canon on full zoom:
Then some from much closer, on the cottage deck using my tripod. Upper beak silver, not black? Check. Chest white, less dark below the chin? Check. Dark shoulder flash? Check. That broad orange bar on the flank? It is! It’s a Magpie Mannikin! Bogey bird of mine for decades; and after searching all over for it, up and down the east coast, I nail it in my own front garden!
Luvverly! Lonchura fringilloides
A while ago I spotted an Ashy Flycatcher in my garden and wrote about ‘nailing it at last!’
This morning I got up at 5.40am, made a cup o’ coffee and settled on my lazyboy chair warmly dressed and covered in an old sleeping bag, binocs in hand. Lovely windless, cloudless morning.
And boy, what a parade!
I saw the Tambourine Dove above.
Two drongos chased a Mother-of-Pearl butterfly over the grass and meadow, over the pool towards me and then right under my patio roof, where one of the drongos nailed it. It flew off to that tree you see below and ate it, shedding the wings. Pieces of wing spiralled down slowly in the still air.
And then to top it off, for the first time here, I saw this at last – I’d heard of sightings down the valley, but I hadn’t seen him in my garden yet. Now I have!
Sunrise was behind them, so poor pics but nice and clear in my binoculars.
A Grey Cuckooshrike! Louis bon Phyre down in the valley had been crowing and I’d been fuming. Now I’m his equal! Ha!
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Saw: Weavers Spectacled and Thick-billed; Starlings Red-winged and Black-bellied; Sunbirds Olive and Amethyst; Greenbuls Sombre and Yellow-bellied; Dark-capped Bulbul; White-eye; Red-eyed Dove; Olive Thrush; Hadeda; Yellow-billed Kite; Purple-crested Turaco; Flycatchers Black and Dusky; Fork-tailed Drongo; Yellow-fronted Canary; Yellow-rumped Tinkerbird; Egyptian Goose; Speckled Mousebird; Barn Swallow; Barbets Black-collared and White-eared; Lesser Honeyguide; Black-backed Puffback; Black-headed Oriole;
Heard: Grey-headed Bush Shrike, Crested Barbet, Southern Boubou, African Firefinch, White-bellied Sunbird, Klaas’ Cuckoo
Hauling out the garbage early this morning a screeching drew my attention to the sky in the SE and there they were: Four pirates in jinking flight heading my way.
Luckily a Kite flying across their path drew their attention; they immediately launched an attack, buzzing him and strafing him and really getting ‘in his face.’ He dodged lazily but kept heading due east towards the rising sun. Four sorties they launched, wheeling round, gaining height, then flying straight at him again.
Aargh! Me hearties, I heard ’em shouting as he flocked off.
Then they broke off and laughingly resumed their journey NW, up the Palmiet valley. Where the Lodders lived, onder in die vallei. I would message Louis Pirates at ten o’ clock! and other important aviation code signals. Avast! and stuff. Heading back your way, scramble aloft! he would signal me in the evenings, as they returned to roost. I wonder who is controlling Palmiet air traffic now that we’ve both left the valley?
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pics: nature picture library – wikipedia – thanks
Rose-ringed parakeets originally come from India and North Africa, but have spread and have now been recorded in over 35 new countries.Their spread has various adverse effects on the ecology, but its interactions with native biodiversity and environment are not completely known and rely mainly on anecdotal evidence. Future research is required to fill these gaps. Trunk cavities represent the preferred breeding sites of these alien parrots and indicate potential routes of competition with native hole-nesting bird species, such as nuthatches, starlings, woodpeckers, barbets, tree squirrels, bats, insects etc. Droppings by ring-necked parakeets may alter vegetation under the roost but direct cause–effect relationships for this phenomenon are hard to assess without more data. The ring-necked parakeet is a potential reservoir of diseases transmittable to humans and wildlife. No data concerning ecosystem recovery after the removal of ring-necked parakeets is available. Eradication and numerical control programs are often hampered by the emotional affiliation humans often have to these bright birds.
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onder in die vallei – down in the murkier region of the valley
What’s that at the birdbath? Luckily the camera is on the tripod nearby and I manage to get a few shots. Ah! An Ashy Flycatcher, the old Blue-Grey Flycatcher, Muscipapa caerulescens. Often seen before, but never in my garden.
As he leaves he calls, and I have my mystery bird that I’ve been hearing, ‘knew that I knew,’ but couldn’t identify. Nailed that call down.
That was yesterday. Today he flew round and round my garden to the tops of all the trees, calling continuously. A piercing call for such a little fella.
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thanks xeno-canto.org for the call recording
The birdbaths have been quiet. Maybe the winter rain we’ve had? Yesterday was different, we had a little flurry. I heard the tirrilink of firefinches and there they were, at the dripping tap birdbath. They usually hide from me.
The tap dripped for sixteen years in Elston Place, and for fifteen years at River Drive; I try to always have a finely-chooned drip going on. Look carefully and you’ll catch a pic mid-drip every so often. The birds love it and sometimes need it. Like us and elephants, they prefer their water clean and fresh.
A Dark-capped Bulbul, a Dusky Fycatcher and Cape White-Eyes joined them.
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On honeymoon in America in 1988 we saw lots of ducks! America has so much water; In the Everglades, Yosemite, the Puget Sound, Wyoming and Cape Cod we went looking for water – rivers, creeks, lakes and ponds, islands and sea inlets – and saw plenty of waterbirds, including thirty species of swans, geese and ducks. Being from Africa, the specials I was really looking out for were the swans – we saw Trumpeter and Mute – and the eider ducks – we saw the Common Eider.
But there was another special duck we really wanted to see! As huge fans of the Pygmy Goose in Africa, we noticed it had a rival: The Harlequin Duck. What fabulous little birds:
I was reminded of this by a great post on DailyKos, where I learnt (a lot) more about the Harlequin Duck:
“I remain in awe of this plucky little duck and its amazing life history. I think of Harlequins as “feathered salmon” — making these epic lateral migrations from the ocean to inland freshwater streams to breed, similar to the upstream migration of salmon to freshwater spawning habitats. After pair-bonding at the coast, the male Harlequin follows the female inland to her natal stream, just as adult salmon home to the stream of their birth. Along whitewater streams within old-growth forests, the female selects a well-concealed nest site in a tree cavity, on a stump, or on a small cliff. Once she lays her clutch of 5-6 eggs, the male departs for molting grounds on the coast, leaving the female to incubate and raise the brood alone. In late summer, the female and her brood migrate together to the coast to ride out the storms of winter. What a life!”
We saw our Harlequin Ducks off beautiful Orcas Island while lurking naked in a hot tub overlooking an inlet to the Puget Sound.
~~~oo0oo~~~
Pygmy Goose pics by By Derek Keats on wikipedia and Harlequin Duck pics by giddy thing on DailyKos and By Peter Massas on wikipedia – Thank You!
