Bird of the week – Week 22 : Common greenshank
The Common greenshank is not a particularly big bird, with a length of about 36 cm and a weight around 250 gm, yet those birds that we see in Southern Africa are mainly visitors...
The deadly Peregrinatio cimex
Everyone is familiar with measles, mumps, rubella and the like. These are minor, mostly childhood infections that are well under medical control and no longer a real threat to anyone with reasonable access to...
Botswana 2010 : Rooiputs Part 3
We changed campsites three times at Rooiputs as we couldn’t get bookings at one particular site for the whole duration of our stay. In fact very often the campsites were purported to be fully...
Bird of the week – Week 21 : Cape wagtail
The Cape wagtail is a fairly common and familiar bird in the gardens and urban areas of most of southern Namibia and South Africa. It is less common through the rest of its range,...
Botswana 2010 : Rooiputs Part 2
When we drove into the Rooiputs camping area the first thing we saw was a small tent tucked away in a thicket of trees and bushes. It belonged to the engineer working on the...
Bird of the week – Week 20 : African hoopoe
The mainly rufous-coloured African hoopoe with its fluttering flight, somewhat reminiscent of a giant butterfly, presents a distinctive sight in the woodland, savanna, and gardens of Southern Africa. Its far-carrying, rather mellow call of...
Botswana 2010 : Rooiputs Part 1
Our six night stay at Rooiputs turned out to be the highlight of our Botswana 2010 trip. This idyllic spot is less than 30 kms from the Twee Rivieren border post and sits on...
Bird of the Week – Week 19 : Lanner falcon
There are a large number of Cape turtle doves at Nossob in the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park and they visit the waterhole in their droves, literally scrambling over each other for a position at the...
Botswana 2010 : Nossob to Twee Rivieren
To say that the roads in the Kgalagadi are bad is an understatement. They are atrocious. If one is not bouncing over bone-shaking corrugations, then its heavy sand that makes the going tough. We...
Bird of the week – Week 18 : Secretarybird
We were driving slowly along the road from Polentswa to Nossob in the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park when we saw a Secretarybird in the distance. Although we had seen many Secretarybirds over the previous few...
Botswana 2010 : Nossob
Having spent seven nights on the wild Botswana side of the Kgalagadi, it was time for us to head to Nossob to restock with provisions and fuel for the next leg of our trip,...
Botswana 2010: Union’s End
I find that one of the special joys of travel is to visit places that I heard about or read about as a relative youngster. I got a great kick, while visiting the UK,...
Bird of the week – Week 17 : Speckled pigeon
What is a “squab” when it is not a short, fat person or a type of cushion? And what is the difference between a “dove” and a “pigeon”? Well, a squab is the term...
Botswana 2010 : Polentswa
The road from Kaa Gate to Polentswa takes one through the most magnificent savannah and woodland scenery. With no time pressures and no problems with grass seeds we were able to enjoy the animals...
Bird of the week – Week 16 : Red-headed finch
The Red-headed finch is about size of a Cape sparrow; hence quite a small bird at just 14 cm in length, yet quite large as finches go. The sexes are dimorphic in plumage; the...
Recent Comments