Cattled

It was an early start this morning, picking up Phil at half seven and then heading north. Our destination, Holy Island, was almost an hour away. The journey up was quiet - a fox just north of Morpeth and a dare devil red-legged partridge were the highlights.

Parked up a Chare Ends, just as Stewart arrived - it's been a while since we last met. He was playing it cool, with time for a coffee before the walk up to the crooked lonnen. Phil and I headed straight off, with song thrush at the main car park making a belated addition to the year list.

Our target bird was jammed on the walk towards the assembled crowd - the cattle egret, a blocker for all but three of Northumberlands birding community, was in flight. Almost barn owl like in impression, the egret flew round the back if a cottage and onto a large area of flooded field where it fed for a short while. Possibly better than that was the long-eared owl that had also ventured out, landing on the fence in front for a few minutes!

The egret was distant to say the least, and when it took flight later it was only to go back into the confines of a secluded garden to feed on the lawn. Viewing was restricted to distant glimpses...

The journey back took in a few northern sites, but little was on offer - very blustery conditions meant sea watching was limited. And by golly it was cold!

Strandfontein: 40 Minute Bonanza!

Greater Flamingo - large flocks present, no lesser flamingo picked up though...

We ended our trip out on 31st December 2009 at the un-touristy location of Strandfontein sewage works (!). Our driver had been a little doubtful of my request earlier in the day ("are you serious??"), but as traffic was quieter than expected we could afford a very quick visit. We approached from Muizenberg and headed along the impressive beach hugging R310 east to the M17 - loads of cape gull flew over the car as we approached. The sea in False Bay had some great crashing waves.

After our sign-in at the Zeekoevlei check point we headed south into the complex, picking up great white pelican immediately. Good start!

Cape Teal

At the "pan", greater flamingo were very numerous and provided a great show for my non-birding companions (despite the stink of the sewage works!).

The pools were also very well stocked with wildfowl, and it was tick after tick for me, with cape teal, red-billed teal, cape shoveler, maccoa duck, red-knobbed coot and on the reed fringed edges, levaillant's cisticola were readily available.

Cape Shoveler (drake on right, note his yellow eye!)

The supporting cast wasn't bad either - a big flock of blacksmith plover loitered on the roadside, while hadeda ibis, glossy ibis, african sacred ibis and little & cattle egret scattered from roadside ditches as the car drifted past. An african marsh harrier quartered the pools, with black-crowned night heron, grey heron, black-headed heron, african purple swamphen, black-winged stilt and avocet plodded round the pool edges. Black-necked grebe were very numerous (I've never seen so many together before), with lesser numbers of great-crested and little grebe in support. This was truly amazing!!

Blacksmith Plover - highly attractive wader, thankfully common too!

Cattle Egret - loads feeding near the road network

Barn swallow and white-throated swallow hawked over the pools and pied crow were numerous too.

As previously mentioned in this post, it was a quick visit - certainly no more than 40 minutes... I could have easily spent a full day here... the Southern African Birdfinder book states that on a summer day 80 species are easily available at this site, while the record by the authors stands at 118... in one morning!!!.

We left picking up a modest 33 species from the car, 10 of which were brand new species for me... extremely rewarding, and perhaps a timely reminder for me to book a hire car in advance of a trip - I could have seen much more had I booked...

So that was the end of our tour, it was back into Cape Town for the New Year celebrations and some nice red wine!