183 : Crowned Lapwing

Crowned Lapwing - Vanellus coronatus

Back into the Ngorogoro Crater today for a look at a smart lapwing and lions. These are a bird of dry grasslands feeding on insects and termites. Their range is from East Africa/ the Somali coast all the way down to Southern Africa. They are the most numerous lapwing species in their range yet remain in the "Red List" for threatened birds.

The great thing about being into birds when you are on Safari is that there is always something to look at. We saw many different mammals obviously and in large numbers but in between the spectacular sitings (such as the ones below) we had a steady stream of a 100 birds species or more over the 6 days that we were actively in the bush in our truck(s).

I had never seen a Lion in the wild before we got to the Crater. On the descent down into the crater (from the lip to the floor is 600 m) Gregory our driver picked up on his radio that a pride of lions were very close to the track with an early morning kill. We weren't really prepared for the "scrum'' of trucks that awaited us when we got to the spot. The rule is supposed to be single file and no more than 5 minutes - try telling that to the "tank commander" types presurring their drivers to double or triple file along the road in order to push in rather than wait their turn. It was ghastly. All the drivers know the rules and some of the old ones like our Gregory obey the rules. Some other drivers don't and the whole thing breaks down. Like this !

You can see a lion has wondered out into the traffic jam. The lions decided that the shade in front of the vehicles was a good spot. We patiently waited our turn and eventually crept up to the main event.

What we soon learnt on safari is that the best things are the things you find yourself - I would even hesitate if I went again to go a big cat that had been called in on the radio - perhaps not in the Serengetti if we were a long way from the big camps and it was a few local trucks cooperating. In the Crater its a scrum of day trippers with all of the drivers all keen to earn the biggest tip.

So we sloped away and got stuck back into our birds and jackals and hyenas and so on and then our Karma paid off. We watch a fantastic lion stalking for a goodly while without crowds of trucks and so on.



Watching the interaction between animals is fantastic. You could feel the tension - look at the expression of these Zebra who know they are being watched from the grass.

This was one of my favourite moments - the Zebra's ears all pricked foward and every pair of eyes is watching the young male Lion that has been working its way towards them through the long grass. Eventually they spooked and ran.

The young Lion came out of hiding and then began the process all over again - magical.

I never knew that Lions had this pattern on their body.

When the excitement was over we could move on surrounded by birds without feeling that we were cheated of anything to look at until the next big cat or Elephant or Rhino showed up. Birds are the perfect compliment to the dozen or so animal "encounters'' that we would get on each game drive. If I put aside the irritation of the first scrum for the Lion kill the crater is on reflection magical - there is always something happening and a huge range of animals and birds are "on tap". A day is enough to see it and it is a beautiful spot. Nothing would prepare us for the Serengetti and the Mega-Herd though which was our next port of call after an hour's flights in a light plane.

Crowned Lapwing, Vanellus Coronatus

Ngorogoro Crater, Tanzania

July 2012