291 : Dunnock

Dunnock - prunella modularis

I was bought the online version of Handbook of the Birds of the World for Xmas. Instead of forking out over GBP 2,000 on the definitive set of guides to all of the world's species you can now pay a subscription and get all the content on an annual basis. Its truly remarkable - 10,000 or so species complete with information, plates, videos, song calls - I have been losing myself in it for hours. In particular I have been wading through family after family ticking off (online) all the species I have seen. Its a fun process. That number will of course be far higher that the 291 that the Daily Bird is currently up to (as there are a lot of birds I have seen and not photographed). I am not sure that it will be more than even 1,000. We'll see.

One thing it does remind is how many common or garden species there are that I probably bump into a lot on holiday in the UK but haven't photographed and posted. So in the spirit of completeness I give you the common or garden Dunnock or "Hedge Sparrow". This is an archetypal little brown job that goes unnoticed as it sets about its daily business. The best place to see a Dunnock is foraging on the ground under your bird feeder - especially if this is close to cover. They are more like mice at times scurrying for the crumbs.

They have quite a beautiful song - proving the rule elucidated by Simon Barnes in his book on birdsong that the drabber the bird the more beautiful the voice. You can apply that rule to Blackbirds, Song Thrushes and even Nightingales which are not the most handsome of songbirds.

I guess most people have heard of the private lives of Dunnocks. They are far from monogomous - A female can take on up to 3 males who in turn will each mate with at least a second female. A Dunnock's love life has as observed by another writer I like Dominic Cousins "more in common with  modern students in a University halls of residence than an old married couple". That seems a bit harsh on today's youth  ! So the females lead a merry dance (or it it the other way around ?) and the males have resorted to some quite unpleasant tactics to try and win the battle of the genes. The male will, after copulating, attempt to plug up the females opening with soft mud in an attempt to prevent the entry of other sperm. I expect the avian equivalent of a chastity belt. So Dunnock matings are often preceded by the male first seeking to free up any dirt from their putative short term partner's entrance before they can take their turn.

It has a point though. The chicks when hatched will often be fed by the female and up to three males so that each brood has a safety net of sorts against one or more of their "fathers" (who knows who is who as the females are mating 2 times an hour with varied partners throughout  the breeding season)  copping it before they have fledged. So the free love commune becomes an extended parenting network. The sort of thing the Daily Mail wouldn't approve of  but the Daily Bird finds fascinating.

Dunnock, Prunella modularis
Boxing Day 2013
Conwy RSPB

290 : Common Goldeneye

Common Goldeneye - Bucephala clangula

The Daily Bird has been a little lapsed this year - the Task has clearly not been a priority. My camera has been dutifully lugged around on business trips but more often than not a couple of hours sat in a bar with a colleague was more of a draw than a trip out to "collect" a species. I haven't applied myself to Local UAE birding by "patch watching" or day trips. I haven't done a weekend away by myself (despite the promised on new leech socks stacked in my wardrobe). I have managed a safari with the family to the Ruaha National Park in Tanzania - without that the Task would have been glacial this year. Birding itself takes time - when you couple it with camera equipment and the quest for a good shot it does require a commitment. It seems on some days quite an indulgence to drive the car into the desert and sit watching a patch of dirt for a couple of hours.

I am in North Wales just outside Holywell at the moment having flown over a couple of day's ago for Christmas. My wife's mother is 89 now and still independent to a large extent, perched in a bungalow on the side of what is an incredibly windy hill side just at the moment. Despite the storm that is battering the UK we made it out to Conway RSPB which is a 30 minute drive away for an hour's stomp around the lake. Conwy is a collection of gravel pits next to an estuary making its way out into the Irish Sea. It has a good visitor centre with a cafe, main shop but also a second hand bookstall which often has quite a few second hand field guides. I have written about purchasing from here in advance of world travels before.

The weather was fine when we set out, that low clear crisp Winter light which has a different quality - a cold, honeyed light - but great for photography. Birds are caught face on by the low rays and well lit. Definition is brought to surroundings. It was Jane's suggestion and a good one and the whole family was wrapped in scarfs, coats, coats, walking boots and even my veteran and ridiculous first birding hat made an appearance. In popular culture it would be best described as something sported by a fat dwarf in the latest Hobbit films. It has ear flaps and is constructed of bobbly dark charcoal grey wool - wool is doing it an enormous compliment - I am sure that it must have a fair contingent of man made fibre.

On the drive over the weather started to pile in from West. We knew there was rain coming in from the appearance of a rainbow over the sea.

Grey clouds, drizzle verging on sleet and a falling temperature reading on the venerable Audi all threatening my desire to get some sharp well lit pictures of Winter ducks. I also had dreams of shining yellow and green siskin, redpoll and other Winter Passerines frolicking in the alders.  Instead as the barometer fell it was more likely to be a struggle in low light, cranking up the ISO and keeping the drizzle off of the lens.

But thats commitment isn't it - I can remember days on the Isle of Sheppey off the coast of Kent in hard Winters being whipped by hail and viscous sideways rain desperately trying to get slight glimpses of identification marks of small brown birds clinging to sea walls. For every day of Short Eared Owls wheeling in the sunshine I would make that two hour drive out from South London to be tortured by fell weather - but the UK list crept on and birds like Merlin, Lapland Bunting, Red-Breasted Merganser, Rough Legged Buzzard were never going to come to me sat in the centrally heated tower hide of Barn Elms in SE1 - a mile or two from the posh London neighbourhoods of Fulham or Clapham. So when I had some commitment to the first task - just seeing birds in the UK that were all new I would happily battle the elements, distance and tight weekend time resources to dig out those ticks. I don't seem to want to pay quite so much for my birds these days unless it involves a 5 star hotel or tent, a gin and tonic and a guide. I think I need to get down and dirty next year. Thats a big tangent !

My old birding hat puts me in touch with that 30 year old though - Xmas 1999 was the Xmas after I rediscovered birds having met Jane and and tip toed into being outdoors thanks to her father and dogs and things like that. I am sure the hat was a gift then - Xmas 1999 - it makes appearances in New Year pictures for a long time after. Trip reports are on an old box of a computer somewhere - set out in the style of a memo as it was a template I borrowed from work changing "from and "to" to "location" and "weather" ! I shall have to dig out all that stuff at some point and do some retro reporting. The first few times I was out on my own I felt very very odd - like a criminal doing something unseemly. Is this what grown up do ? Well evidently yes for fifteen years since.

So to Conwy in a different century and accompanied by my 12 and a 10 year old boys - 15 years after meeting my wife. A coffee and a wholewheat star with white chocolate - a nice leisurely stroll from hide to hide until my eldest thought we had lost the youngest and started screaming at me to hurry up. He gets anxious when the younger one runs ahead - I don't as the path leads back to a nice centrally heated coffee shop overlooking a play area ! I'd feel differently on a path in say Tanzania on the way back from dinner or breakfast. A Goldcrest defeated my best efforts to get a shot - painful - the ducks on show had all been logged (I think ?) on the Daily Bird. Siskin went over my head high and at speed.   Frustrating - But then hoving into view like a beautiful ship from the boreal North, a viking gem with a great prow - a Goldeneye. A fine male example - a long way off and in low light so you will have to excuse the picture. The picture below gives you a better idea of the distance and this with a 400 m lens at full stretch (thats a 25-30 x in birdwatching terms).

The clue to the trained eye is that big fat black head (actually very dark glossy green - and now you can understand why I crave that Winter light !) and the white neck ring. To the left I think are Northern Teal, much smaller and the top most bird is just showing the scoop up of its delicate bill. There were Mallard, Gadwall, Shovelor, Coot and Moorhen scattered across the surface of the lakes (all logged on the bird) but only this one male Goldeneye. So whats so special about these ?

For starters (and mains and pudding) they breed in hollows and holes in trees. Often in coniferous forests in the high North near to freshwater lakes. Heres the trick - The ducklings when ready to fledge have to launch themselves from their nest high up in the canopy to crash down to the forest floor before making their way out to the Lake following Mum.  Check out this amazing picture here of the leap of faith ! . Which brings me back to Xmas.

One of my Xmas presents this year was a Goldeneye nesting box - a generic one by way of an RSPB Home for Wildlife gift  - but the money donated will put up a box somewhere for the RSPB in Loch Garten or the like. So if it goes up this Winter by June little balls of black, white and grey fluff will be launching themselves out on their great adventure.  One of my boys got a home for a water vole and my mother in law I think a doormouse box somewhere. Somewhere in the high crisp North my little box should be hanging on a tree - a box full of promise.

So I like Goldeneyes because they are beautiful but also because of how they start off in life. Great ducks.

Goldeneye, Bucephala clangula
RSPB Conwy
Boxing Day, 2013

289 : Grey-headed Bush Shrike

Grey-headed Bush-Shrike - Malaconotus blanchoti

This does feel like cheating. Another bird that on  closer inspection turns out to be something that I didn't think it was. The bulky head, massive bill and yellow eye show this to be a Grey-headed and not a Suphur-breasted Bush-Shrike.

I seem to be in a bit of a birding wilderness at the moment - I am not actually birding. I haven't been out with my camera in a number of weeks - I have even travelled without it packed or if I have - not with the long lens. I have a trip to the UK in two weeks with a couple of days at a weekend first of all - in theory I could get a bit of birding done. There are numerous easy species that I should be able to pick up even just on  bird feeder. 2013 has not been a good year in retrospect given that 2011 was only part of a year it is my worst year of the 3 calendar periods I have spent on this site. If I conclude  100 birds in a year we are of course looking at 100 years to finish the task. The chances of me living to 150 are minimal so even 2 and half years in I am failing miserably. I wonder if I could take a sabbatical and just bird for 3 months !! That would be something.

I have been busy at work, and with rugby, time seems to be in short supply (but I still find time to lie around doing little at times). Its not a general malaise - I just need to invest in  morning or an afternoon with my camera and a patch of scrub and take it from there. Then I will feel guilty that  haven't hung a picture or done something "useful". It does just all seem to be work, the rugby club and flights to here and there and packing and unpacking at the moment. No time for birds - which feels like no time for myself. Thats not true though - its what you choose to spend time on. My parents are over at the moment so free time is spent with them.

Perhaps I will try to just get a couple of hours to myself at some time in the next week or so and go from there.

Grey-headed Bush-Shrike, Malaconotus blanchoti
Ruaha National Park, Tanzania
July 2015

288 : Sulphur-Breasted Bush-Shrike

Sulphur-Breasted Bush-Shrike - Malaconotus sulfureopectus

This is real blow up of a bird that you hear but don't see normally. Hidden in the canopy this beautiful Bush-shrike is a real birder's bird. That's a real tequila sunrise of a breast - orange juice and grenadine !

I think I connected with this bird on our last game drive down by the Great Ruaha River. A River I now read is in danger of drying up and the national park dying. A project to help people by irrigating rice paddies is taking away the water further upstream - in the dry season the water completely stopped flowing and the animals are being forced away from the river and out of the park. The situation is either changed now or the park dies.

I am not sure what the answer would be - you would have to compensate the farmers and find them a livelihood elsewhere.  We cannot let Tanzania's largest national park just die - starved of water that fuels the abundance of big game.

All these pictures were taken on a 2 or 3 hour drive where we didn't get more than a kilometre or two from the camp. There are two types of birders - stompers and a*sers. This game drive was an abject lesson in lazy birding - Take a much smaller patch and see what turns up. There were several birds that we couldn't get onto with the bins let alone the camera - a Klaas cuckoo for example that drove my assistant guide Tony nuts as it would have been a lifer and we barely got a peek at it. We just moved 10 yards at a time picking up birds but all the while surrounded by an abundance of game that would have been the main event on any other drive.

But looking back I was just soaking it up - not in hurry - not looking for Cheetahs, Lions or Leopards, just looking for birds and tripping over a whole ecosystem on the doorstep of my tent.

And to top it all a family of elusive Lesser Kudu - I have only just noticed the third animal in the left hand of the frame - Here at range and then blown up so that you can see the more pronounced barring. Perhaps half the size of the stately Greater Kudu we only came across these creatures on I think one or two other occasions.

And zoomed in a bit you can see the differences on these elusive Kudu. More stripes, much smaller.

I am not sure what needs to be done or can be done but I do know its a place that needs protecting. There are enough people on this planet and we need to be cleverer about where we build our rice paddies. The day we wipe out the last big wildernesses for these big animals I will probably be gone - but I hate to think of what we will have done in just 2 or 3 generations. Its easy for me - a safari going lawyer who lives in a villa in the Gulf fuelled by desalinated water to preach about protecting national parks - I have a carbon footprint the size of Mars. The only thing I do know might work is to get numbers of people paying large amounts to visit these places, do it in a sustainable way and then get the money to the people around the edge of the park - farming wildlife !

I see lots of good news stories as well based around wildlife tourism - 300 or 400 people at a time employed to support game reserves in Botswana that are being restored for example - but if the tap is turned off by mismanagement of a river system as it has been in Ruaha then its going to be hard to get people to visit a gameless dust bowl and people still need to be fed.

What to do. I am not Tanzanian.

Sulphur-breasted Bush-Shrike, Malaconotus sulfureopectus
Ruaha National Park, Tanzania
July 2013

287 : Green-winged Pytilia

Green-winged Pytilia - Pytilia melba

I really am scraping the barrel now from holiday. Half snapped shots of small birds lurking in bushes - its the real flavour of birding ! This from my only afternoon birding on my own in Tanzania. A grey head, green wings, red tail and a light barring on a pale front reduce the candidates considerably to the Pytilias. Of them Green-winged seems 95 % likely and this a female.

These are small brightly colourd waxtails found in pairs and small flocks in bush country and wooded grasslands. Whats the difference between bush and wooded grassland ? Oh dear I will have to go back to Africa to sort that one out ! These birds are often on the ground or low down in thick cover - on that basis I did well to get this shot in grass, bush and wood !!

287 - creeping in-inexoribly foward toward the 300 although I am not sure I have the gas in the tank. I'll keep keep going but at some point heaven forbid I will have to start birding again !!

Ruaha National Park, Tanzania
July 2013

286 : Long-tailed Cormorant

Long-tailed Cormorant - Phalacrocorax africanus

A common african version of the Cormorant present on a wide range of different waters. This solitary bird was the only one we saw and I am not sure if it was usual or not for the Ruaha river. As memory serves me our guide Lorenzo was surprised to see it there.

Ruaha National Park, Tanzania
July 2013

285 : Yellow-collared Lovebird

Yellow-collared Lovebird - Agapornis personatus

I had a recent go at describing the larger "Psittaciformes" family relatively recently here when chalking up my first parrot. All a question of size so we are down at the smaller end with another lovebird. Last year in the North of Tanzania we bumped into the lovely Fischer's Lovebird nesting under our chalet roof at a budget lodge near to the Ngorogoro Crater.

These Yellow-collared Lovebirds were not nearly so obliging. They were extremely shy and had a very real habit of flying to the side of the vehicle from where the sun was shining as soon as you got within even ten metres. They are no more than 6 inches long so these are a small target.

They look out of place don't they. We are so conditioned to expect this sort of bird to live in a cage its whole life. I can tell you that every atom of their being is resistant to that ! They do not hang around when they see people !

One thing I love about parrot forms is the dexterity with their feet and tongue in particular. They can crack open a seed or nut and very gently ease out the soft tasty parts with their muscular tongues. We spent a few minutes watching one flock working itself through some long grass and bushes where they were feeding.

Most of the time the time this was my view - if I was lucky ! At the top of a Baobab tree and on this occasion not silohetted by the sun.

I will leave you with two views that sum up Ruaha for me this morning. One of a Baobab - incredible "trees" from the dawn of time that can live for thousands of years. Lorenzo, our Italian guide would comment how these trees were here when Christ walked the earth. Very Italian and passionate. You can buy the seeds flavoured in different ways in plastic tubs in African towns - they taste weird - slightly sour - the seeds melt in your mouth and have a cotton wool/raw potato texture that it is hard to describe !

A second tree an Umbrella Thorn or Acacia with its "stylists" - A giraffe and foal. I love this picture because its one of the first I took understanding that you can put the whole scene in focus with a steady rest and a large F number. Camera magic for me - I really didn't have a clue until relatively recently. As ever you can click on these pictures to get a better view - they are all taken with the new canon body and the last two with a few million pixels.

29 degrees in Dubai this morning at 7 am so really no excuse not to pack the camera bag, a packet of shortbread (top birding fare) and a can of bitter lemon - heaven knows if I got the bag packed on Friday  I could be out of the door at 7 am on Saturday. I am seeing reports of the world's birds on the move - Red Necked Phalaropes in Al Ain, White Storks in Fujeriah, Caspian Plovers up at the Pivot Fields. It would be good to go through 300 with a local picture. That's half a plan.

Yellow-collared Lovebird, Agapornis personatus
Tanzania, Ruaha National Park
July 2013

284 : Brown-crowned Tchagra

Brown-crowned Tchagra - Tchagra australis

These are a skulking family of bush-shrikes, feeding on the ground and rarely ascending above head-height. There are 4 similar looking species in Africa told apart by head patterns. I am going with Brown-crowned as the front parts look buff rather than grey to me and the crown is brown with a distinct black edging stripe rather than black all over. This was held out to me as a "Tchagra" - would it were so simple. Smart little birds about the size of a small dove we would run into these most days - but on one occasion only I managed a shot. Believe it or not I let a lot of birds go through in the interests of family harmony and to try and keep the boys engaged. They did well - up to 9 hours a day for 6 days in a safari truck across perhaps 12 drives. Hanging around for half an hour to get "the shot" of a bird thats hopping about and it brown isn't going to cut it some days. They have suggested that we have now "done Tanzania" after 2 years - we are off to Rome on Sunday for 5 days for half term. Not a monkey or deer there. Unless I see absolute commitment to art and history its back to the bush ! Only joking !

Hanging around trying to get a shot of a Greater Kudu in mid leap is a good game. I don't know what the delay between pressing the button and taking a picture is - Out of I think 4 Kudu who were going to perform leaps across the road (the crack in the pavement game for ungulates ?) I only managed to get one in mid jump with its head in view - and another who just considered ambling across was OK. I missed pretty much in  its entirety the male on this occasion. If I haven't impressed on you size and grace of these giant antelope yet all I can suggest is a quick hop down to Mid/Southern Africa. These have overtaken Hartebeest and Topi in my mental menagerie. The power in those legs.

So I managed this one at a walk.

Not so bad !

Take off !

They can leap over a safari truck if push comes to shove.

A younger male I think.

I am still quite shy of taking 100's of pictures and just letting the digital camera roll. Something in me still tries to husband film that doesn't exist anymore. Or perhaps its the idea of filling the camera card. I think if I had my time again in this moment I'd just let the thing whir and see what I got. I am bit too stingy with my resources. I only took I think 6,000 pictures in 6 days. I have whittled them down quite  lot - you should see some of the dross ! You have to be ruthless. I still wish I had taken more of people and scenery. Context.

The joy of watching elephants feeding up close.

The vast open spaces - here the Ruaha river running through a parched landscape. Highlands in the background. I am now an official safari "bore". I must get out this Saturday if only for an hour as I m not actually birding at the moment. I am vicariously re-birding Southern Tanzania from my own Mac.

I bought a quite old book - birding spots of the UAE - it might be quite a good game to go and see what survives, what has been built on and so on. I could pdf up the little drawing and directions and then we could see whats left - Quest for a Crab Plover e.g. Spending every morning mentally in Tanzania is making me dissatisfied with my lot here which is not a good thing and frankly a little rude ! I have Saturday free I believe so an early start with the camera - perhaps a trip up to Umm Al Quwain in search of overwintering Crab Plovers would be a good start. Thats a bird I haven't seen and that's really indictment on my commitment to "local birding". Its all time isn't it. Rugby season has kicked in so Saturday is really the only day as we get up early here in the week and school drop offs are early and then its dark by 6.30 these days. No long Summer evenings by the Thames - I used to bird along the Thames in the East End after a hard days lawyering in my late 20's. I have done lunch time dashes from work but its not really the ticket - you don't want to go back to work. Time to reengage with what's on my doorstep. Really over the mid-term I have a trip to Rome, a trip to London with work and then Xmas in the UK - so its got to be UAE birding to keep the clock ticking over !

Check this out !  A new owl in Northern Oman (link sent courtesy of a friend and old Dubai resident). Now we're talking. Only 7 ! Thats a like a Jacque Cousteau mission on land.

Brown-crowned Tchagra, Tchagra australis
Ruaha National Park, Tanzania
July 2013

283 : White-crowned Lapwing

White-crowned Lapwing - Vanellus albiceps

I do have a need for a database that I carry in the field that can tell me very quickly whether I have seen a bird and whether I have photographed it before. I had an "incident" last month when I double posted an Emerald Spotted Wood-dove - With this bird I am almost passed it by because I thought it was a Yellow-wattled Lapwing - penny a dozen I thought - wrong continent Neil ! Its understandable - these birds have the longest yellow wattles I have ever seen however that does not make them an eponymous shoe-in. The name was taken by an Indian Lapwing leaving the discoverer of this wader scratching around to find another distinguishing feature. Well forgive me if the white crown didn't exactly leap at me from the river bank.

I have to say I have never seen a bird sitting in the position. It seems to be resting on the backs of its lower legs and actually propped up on it tail. This must be how a bird sits on eggs but with longer legs like these they cannot all tuck in underneath if that makes sense. Anyway I was looking at this picture and thinking weird stance - while I was making sure that it wasn't a Yellow-wattled Lapwing (linked here from a trip to Sri Lanka two years ago).

I thought I would throw in one of our favourite animals as a family today - a Bat-eared fox. On arrival at Kwihala the guides were quizzing the boys about what sort of animals they wanted to see - leopards, lions cheetahs they were asked ? No out comes various snakes, pangolins, aardwolfs (because they are "aard" naturally), honey badgers (I could write a dozen posts on those if I haven't already), Aardvarks, but also these beautiful little foxes - Bat-eared foxes. Now we had never seen one and a guide once in Ngorogoro tried to convince me that a Golden-back Jackel was a Bat-eared Fox (we were too polite to insist otherwise) but a lifetime of animal books and the BBC prepares you for each encounter doesn't it.

We pulled off the road after Tony had spotted this pair squatting under bush in the shade. Faces from a cartoon - eyes slightly too close together and the obvious apendages ! Our love affair with the underlooked and driven past in Africa will be hard to shift. Lions - you run over them everyday (well not exactly but in a good park in the right season the liklehood is that your guide knows where to find them). A bat-eared fox on the other hand - I don't know but we seemed to be the only people in camp getting excited about these "critters". Ah ?!? You can see people thinking "weird" people when you swapping a picture of a Bat-eared Fox for one of a Leopard or a male Lion.

We had one other lovely little encounter - same pair on a different day and a roll in the dust - or I think ash from a burnt part of the bush. The whole encounter lasted a few seconds I just held down the button like a paparazzi at one point. They are so skittish and full of energy when active.

Lovely - the Bat-eared victory roll.

And back to camp - a picture here of the tent I shared with my eldest son - the dry season coming into full swing and the Autumnal shades on the different types of willow.

In the height of the busy season at work (which is now) I often think I should have spent more time just sat by my tent flat watching the world go by - during the longish siesta I would churn through photos - saving down into albums for each game drive. There is a whole year to edit photos but only 3 hours a day to sit and watch the bush from the veranda of your home away from home. By the time you get back from the evening drive its usually dark and time for a shower and dinner - the only free time really is the siesta. Small birds in the bush, the odd impala, sometimes a giraffe walking through camp. Wheres the airport !

Life has cooled down a touch in Dubai so early mornings I should be able to get out and see whether I can pick up some more local pictures. 300 is coming up soon so something special for that would be good.

Yellow-wattled no ! White Crowned Lapwing, Vanellus albiceps
Tanzania, Ruaha National Park
July 2013

282 : Pygmy Falcon

Pygmy Falcon - Polihierax semitorquatus

A stunning little miniature raptor standing no more than 8 inches tall. This is the male bird taken at some distance hunting from a perch at the top of a tree. These tiny falcons will take small insects, small mammals and small reptiles like geckos.

These birds will take over weaver nests after they have completed all of the hard work, including lining the chamber. In the case of Sociable Weavers the falcon will take up residence at the edge of colony and then pick off the birds themselves as they raise a brood - so housing and dinner laid on for free. 

We watched this bird swoop down to take probably a beetle or other insect. A pocket sized packet of falcon and one I'd like to catch up with again.

On the same game drive we came across this large and very successful pride. Whats not to like about lion cubs !

They really are this regal in the wild.

This one the youngest - the big successful male in the background probably the father.

Absolutely helpless without the pride despite those big paws. I think there were at least 3 cubs, 5 lionesses and a big male. The most successful group in Ruaha taking up a large territory near to the river. Eden.

Pygmy Falcon, Poliheirax semitorquatus
Ruaha National Park, Tanzania
July 2013

281 : Goliath Heron

Goliath Heron - Ardea Goliath 

Back down by the mighty Ruaha River for the greatest of all the herons. Over a metre and half tall they are taller by half a metre than a Great White Egret and they are four times as heavy. Their wingspan is a full metre bigger than a grey heron - 7 feet ! In flight I am told they appear monstrous - barely managing to get airbourne and they hang their legs straight down rather than trailing them behind like other herons.  I have been itching to see one of these since I first set foot in Africa. They are usually found by swamps and lakes.

In my research to write this short piece I came across some footage that is not for the squeemish - a Goliath Heron eating a baby crocodile a good foot or more long - I am not sure the thing is even killed before it is swallowed whole ! Anyway here's  the link if you want to put yourself of lunch.

I leave you a picture of some lions enjoying the view out across the river. Taking a very keen interest in the buffalo making their way along the riverbank. It was a lovely spot.

Goliath Heron, Ardea Goliath
Ruaha National Park, Tanzania
July 2013