Ringing and upcoming meetings

I will be ringing birds at the Paarl Bird Sanctuary this Saturday (24th Sep) from 7.00am. This sanctuary is part of the Paarl Sewerage Works and is a great birding venue. Please feel free to come through and join me, visit a little while and do some water-bird watching.  The monthly water bird count will also be taking place that day (run by group in Paarl) so there will be plenty of bodies around.  Remember this venue is not safe for birding on your own. 

I will be ringing birds at the Wild Flower Garden behind the Franschhoek Huguenot Memorial Museum on Saturday the 1st of October from 7.00am.  As always, you are very welcome to come down and see how we do it, and walk around the garden looking for our own lovely birds.  

The next monthly meeting is the following Saturday, 8th of October and we will be having Dr Bool Smuts from the Landmark Foundation speaking to us.  They work in many areas of conservation and sustainability but will be talking to us about the sourge of gin-traps used by sheep farmers to control predators, especially the effect on leopards.  Dr Smuts is a well respected conservationist and it is an honour to have him talk to our club.  I hope that as many of you as possible will attend, and feel free to bring guests along.  Please remember the R5.00 per member and R20.00 per guest entrance fee/lucky draw ticket. All these little amounts help towards growing a meager kitty.

Lastly, Jill Heistein has had an op and we wish her a very speedy recovery and send lots of love.  Please keep her in your throughts.  I will be sending some flowers from the club for her.

See you all soon, happy birding!

Artemis Ringing

Did a spot of ringing in Andrea's beautiful garden a few days ago.  This was the first little one in the net, an Olive Thrush.

After many years of tenderly lavishing the garden with love and care, she and Kobus have created a wonderfully lush indigenous haven just right for birds and beasts of all kinds.

The attention to detail in the garden provides interest and fantasy around every corner.

Even scorpions have a home here!

Birds ringed were Olive Thrush, Southern Masked Weaver, Cape Robin-chat, Cape Canary, Cape White-eye and Common Fiscal.

Thanks Andrea and Kobus for your hospitality and we hope to be back soon to ring some more of your little feathered friends for you.

Karoo Desert Botanical Garden in Worcester

Saturday the 20th of Aug was a beautiful sunny and hot day which followed and preceded very rainy weather so it was fortuitous when that date was chosen some 3 months ago for this outing, by the Tygerberg Bird Club.

Ten BBB club members met up at 7.15am and traveled together to Worcester, with one group taking the shorter  High-way route in order to pick up Johann on the way.  The rest of us took the scenic route over the Franschhoek Pass and through Villiersdorp.  The mist was thick on the ground most of the way, making for very beautiful scenery.

On arriving at the garden, the TBC had already started their walk so we looked around the car park and the planted gardens and almost immediately spotted the White-backed Mousebirds.  Quite a few of them around and one looked like he'd just had a bath. We were trying to spot the colourful back in this pic but I love the scraggly look as he tries to dry off in the sun.

We also spotted Speckled Mousebirds and Red-faced Mousebirds.  Just a bit further on we were treated to nice sightings of a pair of Chestnut Vented Tit-babblers.  House and Cape Sparrows were abundant in the area and some juveniles were also seen.

Pat and John Ruane

The garden was literally packed with Southern Double-collared Sunbirds and they were seen around every corner.  Such beautiful birds, we didn't mind looking at them every time.

Male Southern Double-collared Sunbird

Common Fiscals (Shrikes) were also seen often and we took time to distinguish between the male and female.

Common Fiscal

We came across this example of a Khoi San "kook skerm" (cooking shelter) and popped in for a group pic... pity no tea was on offer.

back l-r:  Mike, Kobus, Andrea, John - Middle l-r:  Estelle, Diana, Robyn, Pat - Front l-r:  Adel, Joahnn

Karoo Scrub-robin

We had then caught up with the group from the TBC at the Shale Trail who told us about the Karoo Scrub-robins at the top of the hill who were nesting.  We all took on the very steep walk up the hill and enjoyed excellent views of the two birds carrying nesting material back and forth.  The scenic views from the top of the hill were excellent too.

The flowers in the garden were at their best, with this week being the height of the Karoo flower season.  We all admired the Chinese Lantern bush (also known as the Karoo Lantern).

Chinese/Karoo Lanter (Klapperbos) Nymania Capensis

The various coloured daisies were gorgeous.

The aloes were also in full bloom and looking wonderful.  Many of the birds were feeding on the blooms and their faces were covered in red pollen.

   

And  we cannot leave out the lovely succulents that also had a few flowers sprouting.

At the end of the walk, we joined the TBC for our picnic lunch and enjoyed soaking up the sun.  A really lovely outing and hopefully we will be back next year.

Saturday Outing to Worcester

This Saturday we will join the Tygerberg Bird Club on their outing to the Karoo Desert Botanical Garden in Worcester.  We will meet at the NG Church parking lot in the Main rd at 7.15am to car-pool.  Those who have bigger cars, please take someone else with you and lets keep our carbon-footprint as low as possible.

Please take entrance fee money (R30.00 per adult, may be less for pensioners).  

Also take: good walking shoes - this is a botanical garden so it should be nice easy walking

Sun hat and sun screen

Water for while walking

Tea / coffee and your snacks / lunch for when we are finished.

Camping chair

Binoculars, camera and bird book if you like.

We will sit with the TBC at the end of the outing to have our lunch and draw up a bird list for the day.

See you there!

Jackal Buzzard visit

Jean Birrell sent through this lovely pic of a Jackal Buzzard that visited her garden yesterday.

Sweet Swees

Little Swee Waxbill's are really pretty and although they are common in Franschhoek, they are so small that they are often missed.  Jean Birrell didn't have that problem today when a little Swee visited her bird feeder.

Lovely!

Check out my personal blog for news of the first ringing session in the Franschhoek Wild Flower Garden yesterday... click here. 

Ringing and upcoming meetings

I will be ringing in the Franschhoek Wild Flower Garden behind the Huguenot Memorial Museum tomorrow morning, Saturday 6th of Aug 2011, from 7.00am.  I will be there till about midday so feel free to pop by anytime you like to have a look and see how its done.

I will also be ringing in Andrea Desmond-Smith's garden in 2 weeks time.

Our monthly club meeting takes place next week Saturday, the 13th of August 2011 at 2.00pm, Otter's Bend, Dassenberg Rd.  Hope to see you all there!  Remember your R5.00 for members and R20.00 for visitors for the lucky draw.  I will be giving a talk on the birds of Franschhoek.  Bring along any questions you have or photos of strange birds seen in the village and we will have a look at them together.

Our next outing is to the Karoo Desert Botanical Garden in Worcester on the 20th of August.  Please meet at the NG Church parking lot in the main road at 8.00am.  We can car-pool and travel there together.  Please let me know if you are coming so that we know who to wait for.

The Fish Eagles were seen on the nest this week so please keep a look out when you go that way and let us know if you see them and what they are doing.  Date and time of sighting will also be useful.

I had a fantastic visit by the local Gymnogene this week.  He landed across the road from me on the roof of the Orpen's house and then proceeded to visit my garden, jumping from tree to tree in search of a tasty morsel.  

Isn't it beautiful?  I love the dark grey plumage.  Do watch out for it around town, it is flying low over the house most days.

My Bird Patch launched

The Animal Demography Unit at UCT has a new programme for garden birders.  It's for those people who love watching the birds in their garden and making note of which one's visit etc, but aren't interested in doing Bird Atlasing on a large scale.  It is the ideal interactive project for our club members to be involved in and at the same time contribute towards scientific research.  This is what it is all about:

Doug Harebottle of the ADU says: MyBirdPatch is an initiative to capture bird lists from small patches to monitor bird population changes on a fine scale. Lists can be compiled for your garden, greenbelt patch, a local nature reserve, a green open space, golf course or school. You can have more than one patch and lists are captured and submitted on line. 

More details and registration at http://mybirdpatch.adu.org.za/

and join us on facebook for more fun and news from other garden bird listers.

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I would like to encourage all of you to join this initiative online.  Its great fun, you can add pictures of the birds in your garden and see what birds are around in other gardens, it may surprise you.  Its easy to register, just follow the instructions on the web page.

Cape Robin-Chats on the prowl

Andrea send me this lovely pic of a Cape Robin-chat being very cheeky.  It knows when the butter dish doesn't have its lid on and takes a chance to steal some butter.

Our club is 2 years old!

The BBB Club celebrated its 2nd anniversary today!  We were hosted at Pat and John Ruane's house in Franschhoek Estate, a huge gorgeous house with spectacular views on all sides.

Johann Burger, one of our own members, gave us a talk on cheetahs and his work on the Cheetah Conservation Foundation in Namibia.  This was followed by a lovely potjie lunch, cooked by our members. Everyone contributed and there was food for an army.  The weather could not have been better, had we ordered it ourselves!  A glorious day.

On the menu was Pork Curry potjie (Pat Ruane), Beef Lentil and Mushroom potjie (Johann Burger), Chicken Potjie (Robyn & Adel Kadis), white rice (Angela), brown wild rice (R & A Kadis), salad, corn bread (Cynthia Woodsong), Chocolate pudding (R & A Kadis) and delicious pavlova (Pat Ruane).  Lots of wine was donated and even 2 bottles of champagne found there way on to the table.

Back L-R:  Robyn Kadis, Hans, Mark Heistein, Angela, Kobus Stander, Andrea Desmond-Smith, John Ruane, Helen Mekie.  Front L- R: Paula (visitor from Argentina), Johann Burger, Mary Heistein, Jill Heistein, Estelle Haasbroek, Eleanor, Tockie Croxton, Jean Birrell, Jane Bewsey, Pat Ruane. Photo by Adel Kadis

Here's to at least another 22 years together, and maybe even more.  Cheers!

Paarl Rock outing

Our clubs second outing for the year was well attended today. Thanks to all of you who came along.  We met at 7.00am and headed out to Paarl Rock, making a detour to Boschenmeer to look for the European Roller that has been there for the past week.  Unfortunately we didn't see it.

We gathered in the parking lot of the Wild Flower Garden and made our way up the mountain.  Our first bird of the day had us all very puzzled.  It was perched at the top of a large Protea bush and the shape of the bill was clearly "sunbird".  I could see it had a metallic green head and I could make out some orange on the top of the breast so I immediately called out "Orange Breasted Sunbird", but it had a large white breast!  We all stood watching it for some time debating on whether it was leucristic or perhaps a vagrant species, when suddenly, the head flew off and the white breast stayed behind!  We had a good laugh when we realised it was an OB Sunbird that had been sitting inside a large Protea flower and only its head was sticking out.

Just up the path, a pair of African Olive Pigeons flew over our heads and landed in a tree not far away and all had a good look at them.  Several raptors were seen overhead and we spotted Steppe & Jackal Buzzard and a Hamerkop was also seen.

As usual there are plenty of Cape Sugarbirds around too.  We also found Malachite Sunbird, Cape Robin-Chat, Cape White-eyes and some Canaries that were so fast buzzing in and out, we couldn't see which ones they were.

Paarl Spa - massage anyone?

The walk up is nice and shady and the little stream flows with lovely cool water. 

The walk ends at the top of the hill and there are great views of the top of this impressive granite rock, said to be the 2nd largest in the world. 

Ericas were in abundance as well as various Protea bushes.

The Pride of the Cape

We made our way down and by then the sun was high and extremely hot so we made our way to the Paarl Arboretum for a quick picnic.  We were hardly out of our cars when Johann found a pair of Olive Woodpeckers pecking away for all to see which was a wonderful find.

While having our picnic we saw a couple of Paradise Flycatchers hawking insects too.
Most of the group made their way home after the picnic but Adel, Cynthia, Johann and myself decided to have another look for the Euro Roller and this time we were successful.  It was perched on the telephone pole at the end of Boschenmeer, at the exact same place Adel and I saw it a few days ago.

Its a great bird for the Western Cape, being that it is a bush bird and not usually found in these parts.  A great end to a good days birding.

First outing for 2011 - Harold Porter

Our newly metamorphosised club had its first outing for the year today to Harold Porter Botanical Gardens in Betty's Bay and then Stony Point.  It was very well attended with 13 members and 3 visitors (who will be members soon, we hope).

We started the morning off at 7.00am, meeting at the big church in Franschhoek's Main Rd.  After arranging car-pooling we were off at 7.15am.  We took a slow drive up the Franschhoek Mountain pass as it was thick with mist and visibility was poor.  We took the route around Theewaterskloof Dam, the R45 to the N2 and then on to Botriver.  There were plenty of Steppe Buzzards on the road and just before turning off to the N2, we stopped to have a look at 2 Blue Cranes with 2 tiny chicks, not more than a few days old.

We arrived at Harold Porter Botanical Gardens at 9.00am and our first bird of the day was a Reed Cormorant at the pool close to the entrance.  A beautiful Orange Breasted Sunbird and a Cape Batis kept us entertained for a while and we continued our walk up towards the waterfall.  On the bridge we spotted a whole family of Karoo Prinia's with chick fluttering their wings and being fed by dotting parents.

Karoo Prinia below the bridge

While walking along the river, we spotted Black Sawwing, African Black Duck, Fiscal Flycatcher, Dusky Flycatcher and heard the Giant Kingfisher.  

Dusky Flycatcher

We arrived at the waterfall and were thrilled to find the rare Disa was in full bloom with many of the beautiful, delicate flowers appearing on the cliff face opposite us, very high up.  Couldn't get a really good pic but this is the best one I have.

 Disa Uniflora

It was lovely being at the waterfall and if it was a hotter day, we may have been tempted to jump into the dark Brak water but it was a bit chilly for that.

On the way back, the weather must have been warming up somewhat and we eventually found the Sombre Greenbull calling "Willie" at us.  We also found Lesser Double Collared Sunbird, Cape Robin-chat, Cape Sugarbird and another beautiful pair of Orange Breasted Sunbirds displaying for us very considerately.

Orange Breasted Sunbird

We stopped at the restaurant for a cup of tea and coffee after our 2 hour walk and caught up on some socialising.

While on our walk, we had of course seen many beautiful plant species and Andrea was kind enough to impart some of her local knowledge to us with their identification.  Here are some of the best ones we found.

Brunia stokei - the only red Brunia sp.

Helichrysum vestitum

Erica mammosa

Fan Aloe (Aloe plicatilis)

Mimetes hirtus - endemic to area - headed for extinction

Crassula coccinea

After tea, we left the garden and headed out to Stony Point to see the penguins.  The first birds we spotted there were Cape Wagtails and hundreds of Hartlaubs Gulls.  

Stony point, Betty's Bay

Hartlaubs Gull

There were also Kelp Gulls and Grey-headed gulls, Cape and Bank Cormorants and of course, the African Penguins and their neighbours, the ever-present Rock Hyrax (common Dassies, to you and me).

Rock Hyrax (Dassies)

African Penguin - escapee from the colony looking for somewhere to hide

After our visit to the penguins, we had a quick picnic lunch and then everyone made their way home.  Thanks so much to all of you who attended.  It was a very successful outing and we look forward to the next one in February.  See you at the next meeting.

PS Adel and I did some more birding after this and you can see what we saw, something really exciting, on my personal bird blog - click here.