Bulletin 349 - South Africa 2020 #3 - raptors, tall birds, some mammals

I was enthralled with my first visit to Africa in November 2018 and so I scheduled another trip with the same guide Casper Badenhorst. As we had done the eastern part of the country from Durban to Kruger NP, we went to the Capetown area and the famous fynbos habitat.

There are a great number of raptors in Africa and always a treat to see these powerful birds. The 15" Greater Kestrel (Falco rupicoloides) is a resident in southern Africa. Like all kestrels it has the brown back, streaked breast and vertical black stripe on face

Greater Kestrel

The 23" Jackal Buzzard (Buteo rufofuscus) has a red chest and black belly. It is a resident bird in South Africa and I had seen it on my previous trip.This was my best photo of this bird.

Jackal Buzzard

The 19" Common Buzzard (Buteo buteo) is a winter migrant in Africa. It is a typical brown hawk with red barred breast. 

Common Buzzard

A great new bird for me was the 21" Pale Chanting Goshawk (Melierax canorus). It is a pearly gray hawk with red bill and long red legs.

Pale Chanting Goshawk

The last raptor of the trip was the 20" Booted Eagle (Hieraaetus pennatus). It seems small to be called an eagle, but I did not name it. I only saw it overhead but it was an easy ID with the white body and black and white wings.

Booted Eagle

I had photographed several species of storks on my previous trip, but the 45" White Stork (Ciconia ciconia) was a lifer for me. It is a winter migrant from Europe. It is white with black wings and a red bill.

White Stork

I also found a new crane for the trip. The elegant 45" Blue Crane (Anthropoides paradiseus) is blue gray in color with black streamer tail feathers. It is listed as vulnerable as it has a very restricted range in southern Africa. Many were also poisoned by an insecticide used on wheat fields. It was nice to see, as it is the national bird of South Africa.

Blue Crane

The Bontebok (Damaliscus pygargus) is an elegant large mahogany colored antelope with white face and legs.

Bontebok

The Cape Mountain Zebra (Equus zebra) is one of 3 or 4 species of zebra. Mammalian nomenclature can be confusing. All zebras have the stripes of course, but notice this one, the stripes do not extend under the belly. Here is the Plains Zebra (Equus quagga) for comparison, and you can see the stripes go under the belly.

Cape Mountain Zebra

I put the different bird/mammal families in single folders for easy viewing

I have photos of 17 of the 65 species of  falcons

I have photos of 70 of the 254 species of hawks and eagles

I have photos of 8 of the 19 species of storks

I have photos of 7 of the 15 species of cranes

I have photos of 23 of the 147 species of cattle, sheep, goats, buffalo

Happy birding and photography,

David McDonald

dkmmdpa@gmail.com

photos copyright 2006 - 2020 David McDonald

To have these trip reports sent to your email, please email me at the above address and ask to subscribe.

Bulletin 348 - South Africa 2020 #2 - new family and Cape songbirds

I was enthralled with my first visit to Africa in November 2018 and so I scheduled another trip with the same guide Casper Badenhorst. As we had done the eastern part of the country from Durban to Kruger NP, we went to the Capetown area and the famous fynbos habitat.

You will see many of theses birds in this bulletin are named for the area.

There was one new family of passerines on the trip as well. The rockjumpers have just 2 species and one is in the western cape area. 

The 9" Cape Rockjumper (Chaetops frenatus) is endemic to the Cape fynbos area. It likes boulder strewn slopes with scrubby low vegetation. The pair will start at the bottom of the hill and work their way to the top and then fly down again. We were lucky to get a pair at the bottom so were able to walk up ahead of them and let them move towards us. The male is unmistakable with his black head and 2 white stripes and dark rufous body.

Cape Rockjumper - male

The female is grayish and duller overall. She came within 5 feet of where I was standing.

Cape Rockjumper - female

The 5" male Cape Batis (Batis capensis) is a striking plump black and white bird with rufous flanks.

Cape Batis - male

The 8" Cape Bulbul (Pycnonotus capensis) is a  dark brown bird with typical yellow vent of the bulbuls. He has a large white eye ring.

Cape Bulbul

The 6" Cape Bunting (Emberiza capensis) is a sparrow like bird with striped head, brown wings and light underside.

Cape Bunting

Next is the the 7" Cape Grassbird (Sphenoeacus afer). The rufous head, streaked body and long tail are an easy ID if you are lucky enough to see this skulker.

Cape Grassbird

The 6" male Cape Sparrow (Passer melanurus) is a gray bodied bird with black  and white head.

Cape Sparrow

The male Cape Sugarbird (Promerops cafer) is a brown bird with curved bill and a very long tail. It is the signature bird for the fynbos area as it drinks nectar form protea flowers and moves around as flowers bloom at different times in the year. We saw it many times.

Cape Sugarbird

The 8" Cape Wagtail (Motacilla capensis) is a rather dull wagtail as it is mostly gray and white rather than black and white.

Cape Wagtail

Lastly is the 7" Cape Weaver (Ploceus capensis). This is a dull yellow female. The male would be brighter with a black face.

Cape Weaver - female

These are just a few of the birds named 'Cape something' but these are the only members of their families I photographed this trip. There was not a lot of originality when Europeans settled first in South Africa at Capetown area and started to name the birds. So if you visit and see a bird you can always guess it is a Cape something. LOL


Happy birding and photography,

David McDonald

dkmmdpa@gmail.com

photos copyright 2006 - 2020 David McDonald

To have these trip reports sent to your email, please email me at the above address and ask to subscribe.

Bulletin 347 - South Africa 2020 #1 - new families and seabirds

I was enthralled with my first visit to Africa in November 2018 and so I scheduled another trip with the same guide Casper Badenhorst. As we had done the eastern part of the country from Durban to Kruger NP, we went to the Capetown area and the famous fynbos habitat.

There are many families of birds such as owls, hummingbirds, hornbills etc. Some have species worldwide and some are localized to certain continents or geographic areas. It is always exciting to get your first bird in an entirely new family.

I did get 3 new families of birds in South Africa this time. The first is the 10" Namaqua Sandgrouse (Pterocles namaqua). The male here has a reddish throat. There was a small flock of the birds drinking at a pond.

Namaqua Sandgrouse - male

The second was the most special, as my first ever penguin in the wild. The 18" African Penguin (Spheniscus demersus) breed in several location on the South African coast. There is one large colony just outside Capetown with a nice visitor center and boardwalk for viewing the birds. It was formerly known as the Jackass Penguin for its donkey-like call.

Of course, it is black and white with a striped head in the adult. 

African Penguin - adult

The juvenile lacks the striped head and is duller overall.

African Penguin - juvenile

There is egg laying at all times of the year in the colony and some pengiuns climbed up on the dunes and even into yards of the homes to make the nest, others dug holes in the dunes for a nest and some just laid the egg on the beach.

African Penguin with egg

This bird is endangered as the population has estimated to have dropped 90% since 1900 to about 70 thousand pairs now due to overfishing in their feeding grounds.

The storm petrels were formerly all considered to be a single family, but recently have been split into Northern Storm Petrels mostly breeding in northern oceans, and Austral Storm Petrels mostly breeding in southern locations. I had seen some of the Northern Storm Petrels on pelagic trips out of California, but I photographed my first Austral Storm Petrel when I did a pelagic trip out of Capetown on this trip.

The 7" Wilson's Storm Petrel (Oceanites oceanicus) is black with a white rump and the legs extend beyond the tail. we saw several of them on the trip.

Wilson's Storm Petrel

The conditions on the pelagic trip were horrible and it was almost cancelled. The seas were 6 feet and it was overcast, windy and drizzling for part of the trip. The boat was a small fishing boat and we had the captain, a guide, and about 6 people on the trip. But we did manage to see some birds, but with the rocking of the boat, it was sometimes hard to keep the bird even in the frame..LOL

Most of the birds were lifers for me. We got 3 albatrosses. The 38" Shy Albatross (Thalassarche cauta) has a wingspan of almost 9 feet. It breeds of Tasmania and ranges over the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is white with black upper wings and tail. It has a grey bill with yellow tip.

Shy Albatross

The 30" Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross (Thalassarche carteri) has a wingspan of 7 feet. It breeds on islands in southern Indian Ocean.  It is white with black wings and tail, but has a dark bill with red tip and yellow line down center of the upper mandible in the adult. we only saw a juvenile and they lack the yellow line.

Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross - juvenile

The 29" Atlantic Yellow-nosed Albatross (Thalassarche chlororhynchos) has a wingspan of 6.5 feet. It has a slight gray head. This one flying at us shows the 'yellow nose' strip on the upper mandible. They breed on the Tristan da Cunha islands in the South Atlantic Ocean.

Atlantic Yellow-nosed Albatross

We got several members of the shearwater and petrel family. The 22" White-chinned Petrel (Procellaria aequinoctialis) is a blackish-brown petrel with white chin and a light bill. It breeds on islands off Antarctica.

White-chinned Petrel

The 14" Manx Shearwater (Puffinus puffinus) is black above, white below and has a dark bill. It breeds in the North Atlantic islands and is an uncommon visitor to South Africa waters. 

Manx Shearwater

The 19" Cory's Shearwater (Calonectris diomedea) is one I had photographed before. It is brownish with a yellow bill. They breed on islands in the North Atlantic and Mediterranean Sea. Several were on the water making it a little easier to get a photo. It is a common bird to find in South Africa waters.

Cory's Shearwater

There was a huge flock of 6" European Storm Petrels (Hydrobates pelagicus). These are in the Northern Storm Petrel family. They were probably organizing for the flight north for breeding. It was raining very hard when we found them, so just managed a couple of photos to protect my equipment. They are small dark birds with white on the underwing as well as the top. In the photo 2 birds can be seen with the wings up showing the white.

European Storm Petrel

The 25" Brown Skua (Stercorarius antarcticus) is a heavy bodied gull-like seabird that scavenges from other seabirds.

Brown Skua

Happy birding and photography,

David McDonald

dkmmdpa@gmail.com

photos copyright 2006 - 2020 David McDonald

To have these trip reports sent to your email, please email me at the above address and ask to subscribe.

Bulletin 346 - China 2019 #4 - Babblers, warbler, flycatcher

I had a brief trip to SW China and managed a few days birding. I was particularly interested in 2 critically endangered primates there, as well as a new bird species discovered about a decade ago.

Babbler is a name of small songbirds in at least 6 different bird families. The Timaliidae family has 55 species and they are called scimitar babblers or just babblers and include the Nonggang Babbler that we say in Bulletin 344. I saw 3 others in this family on the trip. 

The 8" Streak-breasted Scimitar Babbler (Pomatorhinus ruficollis) is a beautiful bird. There are several subspecies including one without a streaked breast. This is the styani subspecies, the most colorful with the rufous breast with white stripes.

Streak-breasted Scimitar Babbler

The 5" Grey-throated Babbler (Stachyris nigriceps) is a brown bodied bird with gray head and some white streaks.

Grey-throated Babbler

The last of this family is the 5" Pin-striped Tit-Babbler (Macronus gularis). It is a yellow breasted bird with brown back and wings, rufous cap, and thin breast streaks.

Pin-striped Tit-Babbler

The next family is Pellorneidae and contains fulvettas and ground babblers. Until about 2008 they were included in the above family.

The 5.5" Buff-breasted Babbler (Pellorneum tickelli) is small wren like brown bird with pink legs and a red eye.

Buff-breasted Babbler

The 5" Huet's Fulvetta (Alcippe hueti) I had photographed on my previous China trip. It is a brown bird with a gray hood and white eye ring.

Huet's Fulvetta

The 4.5" Yellow-bellied Warbler (Abroscopus superciliaris) is in the small (32 species) cettia bush warbler family. It is the second of this family I have photographed. It is olive above, yellow below with a gray head and bright white eye stripe.

Yellow-bellied Warbler

The last bird is an old world flycatcher. It is the beautiful 11" White-rumped Shama (Copsychus malabaricus). This is a male with the blue black back and breast and rusty belly. The long tail is black and white. This bird has also been introduced into Hawaii.

White-rumped Shama - male

I put the different bird families in single folders for easy viewing

I have photos of 5 of the 55 species of  scimitar babblers

I have photos of 2 of the 70 species of  fulvettas and ground babblers

I have photos of 2 of the 32 species of cettia bush warblers

I have photos of 36 of the 328 species of  Old World flycatchers

Happy birding and photography,

David McDonald

dkmmdpa@gmail.com

photos copyright 2006 - 2019 David McDonald

To have these trip reports sent to your email, please email me at the above address and ask to subscribe.

Bulletin 345 - China 2019 #3 - Bulbuls, vireo, crow, magpie

I had a brief trip to SW China and managed a few days birding. I was particularly interested in 2 critically endangered primates there, as well as a new bird species discovered about a decade ago.

Bulbuls are a large (153 species) Old World family of birds, so one can find several species on any trip to Africa or the Orient. I photographed 3 new species on the trip. The first is the 8" Black Bulbul (Hypsipetes leucocephalus). The subspecies I saw is all black with a red bill, and legs. Interestingly as you can see from the species name, there are subspecies with white heads.

Black Bulbul

Next is the 9" White-throated Bulbul (Alophoixus flaveolus). This is a brown backed bird with yellowish breast and white throat and a nice bushy crest. The range of the bird is Himalayas to Thailand and just barely makes it into southern China. The Birds of China says it is an occasional bird in limited range of China. So it was a treat to find it.

White-throated Bulbul

Last is the 7" Black-crested Bulbul (Pycnonotus flaviventris). It is a yellow bird with a black head and crest.

Black-crested Bulbul

The corvidae family (134 species) consists of crows, jays and magpies. Crows are familiar and mostly all black birds so nothing special to look at. I saw the 20" Large-billed Crow (Corvus macrorhynchos).

Large-billed Crow

More interesting are the long tailed magpies. The 19" White-winged Magpie (Urocissa whiteheadi). This is a black and white bird with bold white wing patches and white tip of the tail. It is listed as endangered with a declining population. The Birds of China says this bird is recorded only sporadically in mainland China. This pair was attracted to a feeding station by some meat that can be seen on the branch.

White-winged Magpie

And the pair on the branch.

White-winged Magpie

The 64 species vireo family are all in the New World except for 10 species. I saw my first one in the Old World on this trip. The 5" White-bellied Erpornis (Erpornis zantholeuca) is olive above and grayish below. He has a bushy crest. It is a monotypic genus and was formerly called the White-bellied Yuhina and was considered to be in the babbler family until 2008.

White-bellied Erpornis
previously called White-bellied Yuhina

I put the different bird families in single folders for easy viewing

I have photos of 14 of the 153 species of  bulbuls

I have photos of 41 of the 134 species of crows, jays, magpies

I have photos of 24 of the 64 species of vireos


Happy birding and photography,

David McDonald

dkmmdpa@gmail.com

photos copyright 2006 - 2019 David McDonald

To have these trip reports sent to your email, please email me at the above address and ask to subscribe.

Bulletin 344 - China 2019 #2 - Nonggang Babbler and non passerines

I guess I am partial to rare birds and animals . I do not mind passing up a lot of common ones to see rarities. Such was this trip to see the langur in the last bulletin.

In southwestern China close by the Vietnam border is the Nonggang Natural Reserve, established initially for 2 primates including the langur we saw last time. A new bird was discovered there in 2005 and accepted in 2008. The Nonggang Babbler (Stachyris nonggangensis) is a songbird that spends most of its time on the ground searching for insects.

It is a 6" brownish and gray bird with a white throat patch and distinctive white crescent on the cheek. It has a pale iris. 

Nonggang Babbler

Many of the people who live near the reserve have set up feeding stations for visiting birders, so my guide and I were able to visit one of these and see the birds close up. They attract the insect eating birds with some grubs. This is an easy bird to see in the right place haha. One can see the yellow grubs on the rock.

Nonggang Babbler

After observing them being fed for 15 minutes, the birds flew back into the forest and perched about 15 feet away to wait for more food.

Nonggang Babbler

The bird is listed a vulnerable due to its restricted range in the reserve. There is similar habitat across the border in Vietnam, so it may occur there as well. The IOC actually does list it in both countries. This bird was definitely the highlight of the trip along with the primate.

I photographed 2 new woodpeckers. The first is the 8" Rufous Woodpecker (Micropternus brachyurus). It is a reddish brown woodpecker. The male has a red cheek patch.

Rufous Woodpecker - male

The 3.5" White-browed Piculet (Sasia ochracea) is listed as uncommon, so to get a photo perched in the open was fantastic. It has an olive back and orange below. This is a female with the rufous forehead. The male would have a yellow forehead. Of interest, it only has 3 toes, rather then most woodpeckers with 4 toes.

White-browed Piculet - female

The only falcon was the 13" Common Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus). This is a male with the brown back and gray cap.

Common Kestrel - male

The 9" Collared Scops-Owl (Otus lettia) is a small gray owl with a thin sandy collar.

Collared Scops-Owl

I put the different bird families in single folders for easy viewing

I have photos of 5 of the 55 species of  scimitar babblers

I have photos of 54 of the 234 species of woodpeckers

I have photos of 14 of the 65 species of falcons

I have photos of 32 of the 216 species of typical owls

Happy birding and photography,

David McDonald

dkmmdpa@gmail.com

photos copyright 2006 - 2019 David McDonald

To have these trip reports sent to your email, please email me at the above address and ask to subscribe.