Neil's Daily Bird: 166 : Grey-headed Kingfisher

Grey-headed Kingfisher - Halcyon leucocephala

This was a common Kingfisher at both Lake Manyara and along the banks of the Mara river in the North Serengetti which was our final destination on Safari. They were certainly a Kingfisher that associated with water rather than roadside telegraph wires or woods. Reading up on the bird though it is not an aquatic specialist, feeding on large insects and small reptiles in the main. They do however nest in a hole in the riverbank.

his chap handily perched on a roadside boulder next to the great Lake Manyara itself.

Above - a picture so that you can get a sense of the backdrop.

Manyara is a long thin park with the entrance at the Northern end of the Lake itself. Many people enter the park on the way to somewhere else - Ngorogoro for example and ultimately they are on their way to the Serengetti to track down the ''spectaculars" (more of that in later posts). There is plenty of tourist spots including the Hippo pool at the Northern end of the park so many visitors never make it as far as the Southern end of the park which is consequently quite peaceful and free of other Safari trucks. It is one way in and one way out. We stayed at the Treelodge which was a real treat at the very Southern end of the Park and by staying a little over 24 hours were able to have 4 decent game drives (One on the way in, a late afternoon drive on the first day and a drive at 6.30 am the next day (with a slight headache after a night of Lions roaring and little sleep) and a fairly long drive through the second afternoon on the way out of the park.

I was a little naughty and hired a specialist private bird guide at the lodge giving Gregory the day off. My thoughts were, having done a mini-Safari in the Yala in Sri Lanka is that there is nothing worse for anyone else sharing with us than being forced to stop for every bird on a twig. I could hear the couple in Sri Lanka we were forced upon audibly sighing every time I stopped the truck for a small brown bird they couldn't see anyway. The plan didn't quite work out as we were forced to share the first afternoon with an Australian couple however they were perfectly jolly and were very appreciative of everything we saw. We spent a good afternoon tracking down leopard with them (Greg I think it was had not seen a leopard). Off to great start on that quest - I managed to spot a kill in a tree.

Above - scooby snack for a leopard. You can see why the Baboons "roost" on the smallest branches they can manage in the canopy at night !

A leopard had killed this baboon quite recently so we were backwards in coming fowards and drove away to give the leopard a chance to come back. Impala were going bonkers in the trees, barking out alarm signals so the animal was about.

The zebras were skittish - something was about - the tension was palable.

Of course we came back later only to find that the kill had been moved altogether. Later on at our sundowner we learnt that a large dutch family who had been on the same mission had seen the leopard walk across the track in front of their truck. Poor Greg was gutted.

So we missed a leopard in Manyara - I really do not care though - across the space of a week we saw everything animal wise that you would expect to see. I think its good to expect nothing and to enjoy everything. We heard odd a tales and bumped into odd people that confirmed to us that some people are just hell bent on seeing the big 5 and tearing around the bush. Not Greg the Australian, after a couple of weeks in Africa he just wanted to see a Leopard but he was very sanguine about missing out. (he'd seen gorillas in Rwanda and cheetahs and all sorts) - we had been really were close to seeing something special, and on our own which is the main thing. We labelled the Dutch family leopard theifs as they had staked out my kill and consequently I expect the leopard decided to move his half eaten baboon.

Finally came one of my favourite moments of the whole trip.

Rounding the corner we saw a bar set up in the bush manned by one of the guys from the Tree Lodge. The kids were straight down and had extracted a Fanta before the van had hardly come to a stop.

Now I am used to a beer after a hard days birdwatching - but not in the reserve with the birds still flying past served by a butler !

This is looking more like Trip Advisor than a birding blog but its hard to seperate the birds from the whole Safari experience. They even layed on some entertainment for the boys in the form of childrens archery game.