Birding and Birdwatching           

TRIP REPORT: SOUTH AFRICA, OCTOBER 1995

I have just returned from a 20-day birding trip to South Africa, visiting Cape Town, the northern Cape as far as Upington, Johannesburg/Pretoria, the south-eastern Transvaal and much of Kwazulu-Natal, including the southern Drakensberg. Reports of increased urban crime & deteriorating health & other social services were worrisome, but hardly visible to non-residents. We certainly never experienced anxiety of any kind, and my lasting impression of the trip will be one of smiling, happy people. If our vehicle passed by a thousand children in the interior, 999 of them - all dressed in school uniforms - were waving! There is much hope for the future. South Africa still offers visitors from overseas more variety than any other African destination.

Before I get to the birds & other animals, a few words on logistics, for would-be visitors. South Africa's inflation rate is artificially low & it appears that the Government has put a firm lid on food prices. This results in very good prices at restaurants: one has to frequent really fancy joints to pay more than R35 ($10) for a main course, R10 ($2-70) or so for a starter and about R45 ($12) for an excellent bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon.

Quality of accommodation & service fluctuates widely between urban & country areas. In all the major cities & some of the larger towns one has the choice of hotel chains such as City Lodge, Holiday Inn Garden Court, Protea, Karos, etc. which offer good value for money in the 3-star category, where one should expect a good, 'generic' hotel room (air-conditioned, en suite bathroom, color TV, telephone) for about $60 per person, per day, bed & breakfast. It's a different story in the countryside. Two-star hotels are often no better than run-down boarding houses with seedy bars, bad food and no service to speak of. This was certainly our experience at the Hantam Hotel in Calvinia and the Kenhardt Hotel in Kenhardt. However, the 2-star Pofadder Hotel was quite pleasant and the Belmont Hotel in Ceres was terrific, especially the lavish buffet dinner!

Even though our October trip was geared towards birding, we ended up with a list of no less than 45 mammals, including Samango Monkey, Springhare, African Wild Cat, Bat-eared Fox, Cape Clawless Otter, Striped Polecat, Large-spotted Genet, Antbear (aka Aardvark), African Elephant, Black Rhino, White Rhino, Bontebok, Blesbok, Red Duiker, Springbok, Klipspringer, Steenbok, Gemsbok, Buffalo, Kudu, Nyala, Bushbuck, Eland, Common Reedbuck & Waterbuck. Both the Cape Clawless Otter - which was feeding in a rock pool in the ocean at Kommetjie and the Aardvark (which really is quite pig-like in appearance) were lifers to even our very experienced local guide, so these two sightings were particularly thrilling. Quite a few of the rarer, nocturnal mammals were - obviously - encountered on night drives, which we undertook just about everywhere. To be fair, we did spot some birds on the night drives too, a memorable one being a Spotted Eagle Owl which just sat and sat right in the road, seemingly fascinated by the quartz halogen beam. We never did see large herds of wildebeest or antelope as one might expect in east Africa, and this is pretty much par for the course in South Africa. Next year, we'll be including a few days in Kruger National Park in a trip, to see if we can add a few of the large predators to our list...

Bird-wise, there were many highlights in the Cape, starting with Jackass Penguin at Boulders Beach, a huge flock of feeding Cape Gannet at Kommetjie, 15 birds of prey including the superb Black Harrier at Langebaan & the diminutive Pygmy Falcon near Pofadder. As always, there were larks everywhere and we 'got' all but one of the local specials: Clapper, Fawncoloured, Longbilled, Karoo, Red, Spikeheeled, Redcapped, Sclater's and Thickbilled Lark as well as Greybacked & Blackeared Finchlark. Due to the excellent local knowledge of our guide, Dr. Peter Ryan, we also found Karoo Eremomela and Cinnamonbreasted Warbler, both missed by a British bird tour in the same area. At Onseepkans the South African border officials gave us the okay to walk on the bridge over the Orange River, and we nearly made it all the way across, adding a Rosyfaced Lovebird, perched high up in a tree on the Namibia side, to our trip list.

Unfortunately, Wakkerstroom - our next stop - was pretty much a wash-out: windy & cold the first day, hard rain the next. So we missed a bunch of stuff there, including Botha's & Rudd's Lark, Yellowbreasted & Rock Pipit. We did manage Wattled Crane, Blue Korhaan, Buffstreaked Chat, Southern Crowned Crane & Redbreasted Sparrowhawk, however, and the Red-throated Wryneck in the garden is a 'dead cert'(g). Our local guide, the affable Dr. Warwick Tarboton, gave a wonderful slide presentation on the Wakkerstroom Wetland Reserve project for us - and a few other visitors - in the dining room at The Weaver's Nest, the birdiest guest house in just about the entire South Africa. Warwick spends a lot of time in the Wakkerstroom area and his slides are really first-class.

Mkuzi Game Reserve made up for this: we rattled up 200 species in 2 days there, including Barred Owl, right on the southern edge of its distribution. Birding around the main camp with Glen Holland on the first afternoon was very exciting as we added some 36 new species in less than two hours, highlights being Pinkthroated Twinspot, Yellowspotted Nicator and the stunning Plumcolored Starling. In an interesting area outside the reserve we added Lesser Blackwinged Plover, Broadbilled Roller, Lemonbreasted Canary and easily the least handsome bird of the trip, a Marabou Stork.

Everybody liked the accommodation at Hilltop Camp in Hluhluwe/Umfolozi - and the food in the restaurant - although my 'Nyala strips in a creamy sauce' was not quite as good as the previous year's 'Fillet of Kudu with peppercorn sauce'. We certainly did not go hungry! Good game-viewing there too, with more than enough White Rhino to satisfy even the most avid animal lover. Hluhluwe also has lots of Crested Guineafowl, which we always enjoy. Very photogenic birds they are, too. The road to Cape Vidal was in the best shape I've seen it, and the birds didn't disappoint either. Without having to work hard at all, we saw Woodward's Batis at the start of the hiking trail, Brown Robin right by the road and Redbacked Mannikin, as well as the elusive Grey Waxbill at almost the same spot as last year, near some Casuarina trees.

Richard's Bay Harbor is getting to be very built up and we were lucky to find Terek Sandpiper on literally the only bit of sand exposed at high tide. A nearby stretch of water produced the promised Pygmy Geese, Lesser Jacana and Brownthroated Weaver, so we relaxed for about 10 minutes! Then it was on to Dlinza, where I got my life Delegorgue's Pigeon (at last) and some great looks at Spotted Thrush. We also had beautiful views of Green Twinspot from within a photographer's hide. The birds were feeding on very fine seed (put out by the photographers for obvious reasons) and it was interesting to observe the husks clinging to these tiny birds' even tinier bills. This, I later learnt, was most vexing to the photographers, who prefer their Green Twinspots with 'clean' bills.

The Southern Drakensberg was great, once again. For the first time, we stayed in Robin & Bella Guy's cottage, adjacent to their home in Underberg. Definitely an improvement on the local hotel: Bella's cooking is superb and both she and Robin are excellent hosts, after-dinner conversation ranging from the origin of Southern African bird names to the intricacies of bee-keeping. With Robin as our guide, we saw every one of the local specials, including (for the first time) Mountain Pipit. The Bush Blackcap could not have been placed better, and we had equally good views of Orangebreasted Rockjumper, Drakensberg Siskin and Gurney's Sugarbird. Bearded Vultures may be rare elsewhere, but certainly not here: for almost two days we were rarely out of sight of one or more of these magnificent birds.

We eventually ended with a trip list of some 450 species, a handful of which were in the 'heard only' category. A copy of the itinerary and bird list is available on request.

Bert du Plessis, Houston.

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