Hideaway Lodge, Darwendale Dam

On Friday (29 June) Julia and I visited Hideaway Lodge, situated on the north shore of Darwendale Dam. It is about 40km from Harare, and at least half of this distance is on dirt roads.
The road passes through some farmland on the way, where we saw birds such as Rufous-naped and Red-capped Larks, and Capped Wheatear.

Rufous-naped Lark

Once at Hideaway, we quickly noticed a fruiting fig tree, in which dozens of birds were gorging themselves. There were several Speckled Mousebirds and dozens of Southern Masked-weaver, but no sign of the Lesser Masked-weaver, which I have seen here before. There were even a few Wattled Starlings feeding on the figs. A stunning male Marico Sunbird was feeding nearby.

Marico Sunbird

The main action was happening at the water's edge. As we stood at the boat launch site, we watched flocks of waterbirds flying past, mostly to a spot about 1km east of Hideaway. There were also a lot of birds already on the floating vegetation along the shoreline. There were White-breasted and Reed Cormorants, but no African Darter. Darters are now very rare on Chivero and Darwendale. Grey, Purple, Goliath, Squacco and Black Herons were around, plus Cattle and Yellow-billed Egrets. Few Glossy Ibis were seen, along with African Sacred Ibis and African Openbill.

Ducks and Geese were well represented with over 100 each of White-faced Duck and Red-billed Teal, 20 Egyptian Goose, 8 Spur-winged Goose, 10 Hottentot Teal, 30 Southern Pochard, 60 Fulvous Duck and, the star of the show, over 200 Comb (Knob-billed) Duck!

African Jacana were everywhere, and Red-knobbed Coot, Black Crake, Common Moorhen and African Purple Swamphen were all common.

Waders were mostly Blacksmith Lapwings, plus a small number of African Wattled and Crowned Lapwings, and a few Three-banded and Kittlitz's Plovers. About 50 Collared Pratincoles were flying around in a couple of groups. Grey-headed Gulls were easily seen, but not particularly numerous. Only two Whiskered Terns were seen.

One of the larger flocks of Comb Ducks

Beautiful African Purple Swamphen

Collared Pratincole

African Fish-eagle was the only raptor seen during the morning. Other birds seen include Senegal Coucal, Pied, Giant and Malachite Kingfishers, Lilac-breasted Roller, African Grey Hornbill, African Pied Wagtail, African Pipit (over 20), Yellow-throated and Rosy-throated Longclaws and House Sparrow. Swallows were fairly well represented with five species, but not as well as in summer, when I have seen up to 10 species. We saw Wire-tailed, Lesser Striped, Pearl-breasted and Grey-rumped Swallows, plus a Brown-throated Martin.

Rosy-throated Longclaw

Pearl-breasted (top right) and Wire-tailed Swallows

A few weeks previous to our visit, a Birdlife Zimbabwe member showed me a photograph of a ringed Blacksmith Plover. One of my goals on this visit was to get the ring number - no easy task! I did manage to clearly photograph the first four digits, and the last two are a bit vague but I think I got them right. Now we just have to find out who ringed it...

Darwendale Dam is an excellent birding destination, well worth a visit. Even a small section of shoreline such as we covered (we walked about 1km of shoreline) can be very productive.

A large group of various waterbirds; mostly Comb Duck