165 : Yellow-throated Sandgrouse

Yellow-throated Sandgrouse - Pterocles guttaralis

This is the male bird - showing well on a game drive while on safari in Tanzania.

A trip to the Ngorogoro Crater today. The conservation area itself consists of the world's largest caldera - a giant extinct volcano crater. You climb up out of the platueau above the Great Rift Valley for some 600 m or 2,000 feet to get to the lip of the crater. The sides of the caldera are heaviliy forested with cloud forest and the road up is used by elephants, lions and other creatures to trek up and over into the basin of the crater.

Above - the view into the crater from its rim. The crater itself is a must-see in Tanzania although for wildlife generally it is far too crowded and "canned". Every sighting attracts a rush of safari vans so its very hard to get any peace to appreciate whats on offer. A day is enough. Having said that the crater and its sides/lip are full of interesting birds with a good diversity given the habitat on the sides and the high plateau of the basin itself.

Yellow-throated Sandgrouse are one of 18 Sandgrouse species. These birds are specialists of the high African plains (800-2,000 m) - they are also found in places like Kenya, South Africa, Botswana, Angloa, Uganda, Namibia and Zimbabwe. When you think that the highest mountains in the UK are at 1,100 m or so thats pretty high.

While the male is striking I think the female above with her cryptic mottled plumage is even more beautiful. These birds will be ground nesting and the crater is full of Jackals and foxes all of whom will predate on eggs and chicks. You could easily scuttle past the female as she lay still in long grass.

Above - a Silver-backed Jackal - a common scavenger in the crater.

Sandgrouse as a family are specially adapted to deal with dry climates, flying long distances to find water in large flocks and then storing it in crops and specially adapted chest feathers and down. It is always counter-intuitive to think of high places as dry but in Tibet where there are high dry plateua the sandgrouse species there will fly to the edge of the melt water to drink before returning onto the arid plains.

This pair were showing really well - and stunning in the golden light in the crater.

Yellow-throated Sandgrouse, Pterocles gutturalis

Ngorogoro Crater, Tanzania

21 July 2012

164 : Augur Buzzard

Augur Buzzard - Buteo augur

Gregory our first Safari guide and driver stopped the truck on the way from Arusha to Lake Manyara so that I could take a picture of this fine fellow along the way. These are a bird of the highlands and surrounding lands. This bird was perched on grazing land on the highland plateau before we got to the descent into the Great Rift Valley.

The photo below is of a pasturalist Masai herder and his cattle nearby to set the scene of the kind of land we were driving through before we got to the wildlife management areas and National Parks proper.

Augur Buzzards are a common african bird in their highland range - striking in their dark and white plumage. One thing that I would say about Africa is that the light strikes you. The air was clear in the highlands - little haze - a beautiful golden light.

This was one of my first african birds - one of the stars of the three hour drive to the gates of the Manyara National Park - our safari van packed with an excited family winding its way down into the Great Rift Valley.

Augur Buzzard, Buteo augur
Tanzania
26 July 2012

163 : Red-billed Oxpecker

Red-billed Oxpecker - Buphagus erythrorhynchus

I have just got back from a week's Safari in Tanzania with the family. Dar es Salaam is a 5 hour flight from Dubai. I am still reeling from the whole week. I saw so much I am going to have to take a month over the long Gulf Summer to process and organise all the ticks, photos, places and memories. I am going to stay on Safari in my spare time on this site for the next month.

We caught the bug for this type of trip as a family holiday when we visited the Yala national park in Sri Lanka last April. I think the beauty of a big game park, wherever it is, is that the mammals, birds and landscape all work together. There is something for everyone - the overall experience just takes your breath away. I have my favourite places but I will talk about that as I post over the next few weeks after a lull of a couple of weeks.

We began the holiday proper by spending a night staying at the Manyara Tree Lodge - a really special treat. Again I will save that for later. Our trip into the Manyara National Park began as Gregory, our first driver/guide for the trip, stopped at the famous 'Hippo Pool' on the 2 1/2 hour drive into the park proper from its main gate. Manyara is a small park set around a lake in the Great Rift Valley. The lake itself is fed by water falling off the escarpment and collecting in the lowest part of the valley. The Lake varies in size according to precipitation but is never more than 2 or 3 feet deep despite being many miles long and several miles wide. The bulk of the National Park is covered by the lake. The park itself is formed from the barrow ribbon of land running along the lake edge and the escarpment itself. The park is heavily wooded and is the home to the famous tree climbing lions (heard but not seen !).

I will make rest of this post as much about Hippos as Oxpeckers.

These giant animals weigh up to 2 tonnes and spend a great deal of time supporting their vast bulk in the water. They typically come out to graze at night. They have no natural predators and their skin is 5 cm thick. Even a fully grown Nile crocodile gives a hippo a wide birth. More people die in Africa from attacks by Hippos than by lions or any other big animal.

The Red-billed Oxpecker obviously has a parasitic relationship with the Hippo - pulling off ticks and lice and their eggs and larvae. The spit of an Oxpecker contains an anti-coagulant to keep any sore it forms running with the blood on which it also feeds. You have to wonder whether any advantage an animal gets from the grooming is offset from the open wounds that are pecked and kept open and fed on.

All over Tanzania wherever there were big animals - not just Hippos but all manner of antelopes as well - I saw Oxpeckers.

I think a shot where you get a life tick for a mammal and a bird at the same time has got to be good. We were also lucky to see these Hippos out of the water in the day as well. Typically this will only happen when it is overcast - presumably they do not like to dry out.

This large animal was home to a small party of these highly specialised starlings. We are off on Safari ! I will move from park to park and to animals and birds rather than dealing with the trip chronologically. I do need to catch up all the postings for July to stay on the pace. I have over 1000 photos from Tanzania to work from - and yes - many were of birds !

Red-billed Oxpecker, Buphagus erthrorhynchus
Lake Manyara National Park, Tanzania
19 July 2012