Another of the Winter highlights of the Garden is the annual migration of the Half-collared Kingfishers from the sub tropical Wild Coast to our more temperate area. These large, magnificent Kingfishers are usually found on quiet rivers with entangled, over hanging vegetation from which they plunge dive for their prey. They are much larger than the similar Malachite Kingfisher and are separated by the black, not red, beak as well as more white on the breast. This bird was one of my “bogey’s” for many years. I would travel to sites where it was “guaranteed”, but I never found it where it was supposed to be. I did eventually track it down and since then, the drought being broken, have seen it regularly.
Malachite Kingfisher
The various back water’s along the Garden Route are ideal habitat and I set out early last Saturday morning to canoe the Wolwe River in search of the Kingfishers in order to see if they where back yet. This river is the western tributary of Swartvlei estuary, named for the Brown Hyena that used to occur here, and large areas of mudflats are bisected by a narrow channel that threads between overhanging trees, ideal habitat.
Wolwe River Mudflats
Canoeing this backwater we did see this glorious bird, as well as Malachite, Giant and Pied Kingfishers. Other specials were African Black Duck, Glossy Ibis, African Fish Eagle and a true special of a White-backed Night Heron.This secretive bird is very difficult to see all along its range especially due to its nocturnal habits and the juvenile that we saw was tucked safely, sleeping in a collapsed tree. This is only the second time I have seen this bird and am planning a return to the spot soon to try and get a photograph.
Wolwe River
Orion is slowly sinking into the West and as Scorpio begins to rise you can feel that Winter has started to make its’ mark.
For me, one of the first signs of change is the high pitched call of the Malachite Sunbird. These magnificent birds are normally found much higher up, in the mountain ranges that parallel the coast. When the cold starts to be felt they descend onto the warmer coastal flats and target the Winter flowering succulents such as the Aloes and Pig’s Ear(Cotyledon orbiculta), another favourite is the bright orange Wild Dagga flowers that are filled with nectar.
A pair of Brown-backed Honeybird’s have also been seen a couple of times and it would be fantastic if these uncommon birds become resident at Reflections. While mentioning honey I should add that our 2 bee hives where both raided by a now resident Honey Badger. I am so excited that this incredible animal has graced us with its presence and hopefully it too will stay(although I will have to re-reinforce my hives).
Our pair of Fish Eagles have begun their mating so we will be watching carefully for further progress and the mating display flights of the pairs of African Marsh Harriers are being heard throughout the day. Grass-birds are being heard regularly in the mornings at the moment as well, and these are new birds for us since we removed the Pine trees. They like rank grass tufts and fynbos and for me they are indicative of our maturing eco-system and restored habitat.
The Brown-hooded Kingfisher trail is one of my favourite walking and birding trails in the area and it gives consistently good forest birds but I was very pleasantly surprised when walking there yesterday with sightings of both a Black Stork as well as a Black Harrier. Both of these are uncommon in this area and yet I saw them both flying together, another example of unpredictable nature.