The Bats of Kasanka: Part Two - Forest Inn

Part One - Kariba


Day two of our trip (Saturday 19 October, 2013) consisted of a 470km drive from Kariba across the border into Zambia and through the capital city, Lusaka, ending up at Forest Inn, on the Great Northern Road to Tanzania, where we spent the night. This was an all day affair!

The border crossing was tedious and mostly hassle free, but we had to wait an hour at the last desk for the only road toll officer on duty to get back from the shops!

Straight away you notice a difference between driving in Zimbabwe and in Zambia - the latter has bags of charcoal, firewood, baskets and even orchids for sale on the road verges, seemingly in the middle of nowhere. These 'vendors' were at regular intervals all the way to Lusaka and beyond, and as a result all of the bushland remaining near the road was under serious pressure from charcoaling.
Not a great welcome to the country! I just hope Zimbabwe doesn't follow down the same path too quickly.

There were major roadworks on the main route to Lusaka, so all traffic was forced to use the dirt tracks winding alongside the tarmac under repairs. This added an extra hour to the drive.
Lusaka itself was dirty, dusty, hot and full of people and traffic. The city central was a traffic nightmare, and we had to find a way around.

The road north of Lusaka heads towards the Copperbelt on the border of the DRC, and was therefore very busy with large trucks and other vehicles. This was not a very enjoyable drive. There was still very little bushland to be seen in amongst the multitude of villages and communal lands.

And then we turned east at Kapiri Mposhi onto the Great Northern Road, and suddenly at was lovely! Most of the traffic was gone, and the bush was in better condition, as we were no longer on the main Copperbelt road.

We arrived at Forest Inn, which is a set of self catering chalets and camping sites in the middle of nowhere, in the late afternoon.

It is set in a stand of Miombo Woodland, so I spent a few hours in the afternoon and the next morning birdwatching. We had now entered the Central Zambezian Miombo Woodland ecoregion (Zimbabwe is in the Southern Miombo Woodlands), so there were a few non-Southern African 'special' birds to be seen.

Miombo Woodlands bordering Forest Inn

(Non-SA 'specials' are in bold). Lizard Buzzard was the only raptor seen. I heard Fiery-necked Nightjar during the night, and saw Spotted Eagle-owl in the morning. The camp had African Pygmy-kingfisher, Crowned Hornbill, African Broadbill, White-browed Robin-chat, Miombo Scrub-robin, Willow Warbler, Ashy Flycatcher, African Paradise-flycatcher, Red-backed Mannikin, Golden-breasted Bunting and Cabanis's Bunting. After much searching the woodlands, I found a few great birds, including Grey-headed Kingfisher, White-breasted Cuckooshrike, Rufous-bellied Tit, Miombo Scrub-robin, Trilling Cisticola, Black-necked Eremomela, Stierling's Wren-warbler, Retz's Helmet-shrike, Violet-backed Starling, Amethyst Sunbird and Red-headed Weaver.

African Broadbill carrying nesting materials in the early morning (hence the awful lighting)

African Pygmy-kingfisher

Ashy Flycatcher

Black-necked Eremomela - the best find at Forest Inn

...and a pair of the same species.

Cabanis's Bunting

Golden-breasted Bunting

Kurrichane Thrush

Miombo Scrub-robin

Rufous-bellied Tit

Rufous-bellied Tit

Spotted Eagle-owl

Stierling's Wren-warbler

Trilling Cisticola

On Sunday morning we drove the remaining distance to Kasanka National Park, which you'll read about in the next post!

To be continued...
Part three - Kasanka, the Mammals
Part four - Kasanka, the Birds
Part five - Mana Pools

The Bats of Kasanka: Part One - Kariba

During my two month stay in Zimbabwe last year, my dad and I decided to go on a 10 day African road trip, as we had done many times before I moved to Australia.
Where to go was a big decision. The range of options was limited to a certain distance from home (up to roughly 1000km, I decided) - we didn't want to be doing too much driving as we had only 10 days to work with.
This still left quite a few choices. The Okavango Delta in Botswana (I've been there before, but would happily go again) and Kruger National Park in South Africa were two possibilities.
Chizarira National Park in Zimbabwe, closer to home, was another maybe.
Mozambique offered Gorongosa Mountain and National Park as well as the Zambezi Delta.
Malawi has Liwonde National Park and Mount Mulanje.
Zambia in particular has a lot to offer; Lochinvar National Park supports tens of thousands of waterbirds (another place I've been, but would definitely go again). Kafue National Park is another place worth seeing. South Luangwa National Park is a fantastic game viewing destination, and this was very strongly considered.

What an excellent selection, and all within roughly 1000km of Harare!

At some point I vaguely remembered seeing a David Attenborough documentary about a fruit bat migration somewhere in central Africa. A quick search told me that the place is Kasanka National Park in northern Zambia, a small park which is nowhere near as famous as the big parks of Southern Africa (Kruger, South Luangwa, etc.).
It didn't take much to convince me this was the place to go, above all the other exciting places - just the simple fact that eight million fruit bats migrate to the Kasanak at the end of every year. What!? Eight million? That's right...

Kasanka is 1050km away from Harare by the route we drove. We avoided the slightly shorter route via the awful border post at Chirundu.

Southern and Central Africa. The red rectangle outlines the map below.

Click Here for full size.
This is the route we drove, starting from Harare. We went through the border post at Kariba, then on to Kasanka National Park in the north. On the way back we spent a few days in the incredible Mana Pools National Park.

With our main destination chosen, plus a few days in Mana Pools National Park on the return journey, we set off on just before lunch time on Friday the 18th of October, 2013. The reason for our somewhat tardy departure was a lack of Police clearance for taking the vehicle out of the country! Luckily, we had only budgeted to get to Kariba that day, so we still had enough time to get there after waiting all morning for Police clearance.

Harare to Lomagundi Lakeside, on the shore of Lake Kariba, about 360km.

In Kariba at last, we stayed in a friend's holiday cottage in the Lomagundi Lakeside complex. We arrived in good time for sunset on Friday evening, and I managed to sneak in a bit of birding around the cottages and the shoreline.

This is the view from the bar at Lomagundi Lakeside. Take a moment to notice how many people there are at the edge of the water, then notice the crocodile lower left, one of many on the shores of Kariba. Scary stuff!

I saw 69 species there including Goliath Heron, Glossy Ibis, Marabou Stork, African Openbill, African Harrier-hawk, Little Sparrowhawk, Water Thick-knee, White-crowned Lapwing, Black-winged Stilt, African Mourning Dove (new bird for me!), African Green-pigeon, Meyer's Parrot, White-browed Coucal, Square-tailed Nightjar, Broad-billed Roller, Southern Red-billed Hornbill, Bennett's Woodpecker, Yellow-bellied Greenbul, Ashy Flycatcher, Meves's Starling, White-browed Sparrow-weaver and Lesser Masked-weaver.

African Harrier-hawk

African Mourning Dove - worth staying at LL just for this.

African Openbill at sunrise

Black-chested Snake-eagle

A rather bad photograph of a Kurrichane Thrush showing partial leucism of the head feathers

Female Red-winged Starling

White-crowned Lapwing

We tackled the Kariba border crossing bright and early on Saturday the 19th, with a long way to travel during the day.

To be continued...
Part two - Forest Inn
Part three - Kasanka, the Mammals
Part four - Kasanka, the Birds
Part Five - Mana Pools

Fiery-necked Nightjars

On 16 October, 2013 I spent an evening at Haka Park catching and ringing nightjars. Fiery-necked Nightjar was the only species caught, and three birds in one evening was a reasonable catch.

The first one caught was an adult female, which we photographed for comparison shots between the male we caught recently. The most distinctive sexing feature was actually the white in the tail, not the white wing-bar.

Left: female. Right: male

The next two birds we caught in quick succession. It's possible they were even from the same nest, judging by their similar age and close proximity to each other.

Both were recorded as age 5, which means between 0 and 6 months old. We could actually be a bit more accurate on the age - they were likely laid on or near the full moon in August (although we can't be sure of this) and would have hatched about 18 days later. This would make them just over a month old, recently fledged, when we caught them.

One was male and the other female, sexed by the amount of white in the outer tail feathers.

The wing-bars of the two juveniles. Not much difference between male (left) and female (right).

Juvenile plumage is actually very distinct from adult plumage. Compare the wings of the two juvenile birds, followed by the one adult bird. The secondaries and coverts are very different in the two age groups. The primaries and primary coverts show less contrast between the ages.

Juvenile male (top) and female (bottom) outstretched wings.

Adult male outstretched wing.

One bird was also moulting its rictal bristles, something I hadn't seen before.

Waxy sheaths are still present on the newer rictal bristles.

A Brief Holiday Away from the Sun

The Vumba is one of my favourite birding places in Zimbabwe. I drove up there on October 13 to spend two nights at Seldomseen.
Not once during those two days and nights did I see the sun!
The mist rolled in when I arrived and didn't let up by the time I left. Vumba is notoriously good at being misty, but this was taking it to a new level. The mist was quite heavy, bordering on light drizzle at times. My waterproof hiking boots became normal hiking boots after a while!

I actually really like the misty conditions, despite the birding difficulties that it entails. It certainly makes for interesting landscape photography.

Despite all the wetness, the birds were still pretty active. I guess if you lived in a place where the mist can blanket everything for days, you'd have to learn to hunt and feed in the wet.

The mist did, however, make it quite dark and exceedingly difficult to photograph birds. I actually gave up trying to get any pictures of real use, and just tried to enjoy the wildlife.

Birding in the forest

I saw (or heard) many of the Vumba specials, including Yellow-throated Woodland Warbler, Barratt's Warbler, White-starred Robin, Lemon Dove, Buff-spotted Flufftail (Heard nearby and tried hard to see this, but no luck), African Firefinch, Olive Bush-shrike, Gorgeous Bush-shrike (my main target on this trip - heard but not seen!), Swynnerton's Robin, Black-fronted Bush-shrike and Bronzy Sunbird.

African Dusky Flycatcher

Bronzy Sunbird male

Olive Thrush

I found a couple of nesting birds. African Dusky Flycatcher was feeding chicks in the nest near the bottom cottage.
I visited a tree where I know Swynnerton's Robin had nested before (last time I checked was in 2009), and lo and behold! There was a nest with an egg in it. There was no sign of the parents, so I left it alone and checked later on. Much to my surprise there were two eggs in the nest, and the parent Swynnerton's Robins were hanging around.

5:50am - one egg in the nest

2:00pm - and then there were two!

 I visited Leopard Rock Hotel in an attempt to escape the mist. It was still misty there, but it actually partially lifted for about an hour. I could even see past the end of my nose.
There were a few different birds here: African Stonechat, Black Cuckooshrike, Red-faced Crimsonwing and Giant Kingfisher to name a few. I also saw Blue (Samango) Monkey and Bushbuck on the golf course.

The mist lifted a little bit. You can hardly see it in this picture

Then the mist returned... Here I am looking towards the hotel, which is behind the barely visible trees on the hill

Between Harare and Vumba is a small town called Headlands. Very near this town is the one place in the country where you stand a good chance of seeing South African Cliff-swallow. The birds have been breeding under two small bridges for a number of years, but their numbers have been fewer in recent years. Hopefully they will continue to cling on. I stopped on the way to Vumba and was perhaps a bit early in the year, as I only saw one distant bird, and no nests.

A terrible photograph, but nonetheless my only South African Cliff-swallow photo from Zimbabwe

Haka Park, October 5th

The BirdLife Zimbabwe walk on Saturday the 5th October 2013 was at Haka Game Park. There was a rather large group of us, around 25 people. This meant lots of little birding groups, and a fairly high combined species count (although I can't remember the number - it's been a while!). Highlights were African Snipe, Black-chested Snake-eagle, Striped Kingfisher, European Honey-buzzard and probably a few others that I've forgotten about...

Panoramic view of Cleveland Dam.

Low flyover of a Black-chested Snake-eagle

Common Moorhen with recently hatched chicks

Groundscraper Thrush

European Honey-buzzard. Not a good photo, but an unusual bird.

Zebra foal

Striped Kingfisher

Yellow-fronted Tinkerbird

Many of my blog posts feature some sort of non-bird type critter that I've found, and this one is no different:

Latrodectus geometricus (Brown Widow). Don't get bitten! Related to the Black Widow, and the Redback Spider of Australia.

Flap-necked Chameleon. This guy was crossing the road, so I turned around save him.  The lady walking past at the time was not impressed when I suddenly jumped out of the car and scooped up a chameleon right next to her!

Male Southern Tree Agama, without the bright blue head colouration

Best of all was a Brown House Snake (Lamprophis fuliginosus) rescued from a busy road by a friend of mine. He gave it to me to photograph before releasing it. The snake was very calm and hardly seemed to mind being handled. It was a most lovely snake.

Snake photography is rather difficult, I discovered

To give you an idea of size