The Cape to the Kalahari - Part two the birds

Southern Boubou
European Bee-eater
Cape Suger Bird at Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens
Cape Gannet at Lamberts Bay possibly the smelliest place on the planet!
Secretary Bird
Southern White faced Scops Owl
Lappet Face Vulture
Bataleur
Cape Rock Jumper outside of Cape Town
African Penguin at Boulders Beach

Blue Crane
Cape Bulbul
Black Oystercatcher

Spurn Point - a memorable day

Had a wonderful day at Spurn Point yesterday, we had been watching the weather all week and felt Saturday should be good for migrants and we certainly weren't disappointed, the order of viewing went as follows; Snow Bunting, Woodchat Shrike, Icterine Warbler, Short Toed Lark, Redbacked Shrike, Red Breasted Flycatcher and Barred Warbler interspersed with plenty of Pied Flycatchers, Redstarts and Whinchats - if only we had taken a camera!

The Cape to the Kalahari - Part 1 The Mammals

There's not a lot to photograph in Normanby at the moment and even if there was we have had such strong southerly winds it has been difficult to stand upright - roll on winter!  So its time to delve in the archives again with a trip to South Africa which we made in 2007.  The trip fell into roughly 3 areas; the Cape including a pelagic trip, the Karoo and the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park - it was  fabulous and once again as is usually the case in Africa the mammals knocked the birds into second place.  So lets start with the cats - in 3 days we had 53 Lions and videoed 3 kills which were definitely very gruesome and not the quick kill I thought they would be.  In each case Kudus or Eland were brought down by female adult Lions but then handed over to usually 5-6 youngsters who were not adept in killing and in one case played with their victim for half an hour before feeding.
A young male Lion

A female handing over an Eland to a youngster

Youngsters awaiting their turn to feed
The mother
Adult male

Black backed Jackals scavenging



The Kalagadi is the best place I have ever been for Lions - far better than Etosha or Kruger and it also gave us our best views of Leopard 



Without these Jackals we would never have seen the Leopard - they were howling and acting very agitated in the middle of the road, we stopped and watched knowing that something was about to happen when the Leopard strolled out in front of our car.

Wildebeests
Brown Hyena -  the evilest  looking creatureGemsbokEland

In the garden this summer

Considering the miserable summer weather we have had it has been a great year for butterflies.  Our Buddleia has been coated in Painted Ladies, Small White, Tortoiseshell, Red Admiral, Meadow Browns, Gate Keepers, Peacocks, Commas and  one very welcome Grayling.  The caterpillar below is a Elephant Hawk Moth which I nearly stood on outside my back door!

 Bird wise the season has been quiet in the garden however we did have a Peregrine shoot across yesterday just above our roof and caused havoc amongst our resident Jackdaws.  We also have at the moment one very ill looking male Bullfinch which visits daily to feed on the honey suckle berries - although his feathers look very worn he appears to have a disease rather than summer moulting as he also seems to have very sticky eyes - I fear the end is near for him.