UPCOMING OUTING: Bird Ringing - Sunday 11 December 2016

Sunday 11 December 2016 @ 06:00 BirdLife Trogons will visit Umzumbe Flood Plain where Andrew & Ivan Pickles will be bird ringing.  Bring cameras, chairs, and breakfast (note: no braai afterwards).

ALL WELCOME. There is a R20pp charge for non-members of Birdlife Trogons.

Please let Andrew know on 082 338 3302 if you will be attending the outing.

Outings may be cancelled due to weather.  Phone Andrew Pickles before setting off.  For further details & directions telephone* Andrew or visit the blog  www.birdlifetrogons.blogspot.com.     ** Please note we cannot respond to text messages or “call me” requests.

Directions:  From Port Shepstone take R102 coast road. After crossing the Umzumbe River bridge turn left down the track to the floodplain. 

Set GPS to DD MM SS.S  =  S30 36 18.5  E30 33 11.03

Kind regards

Hazel van Rooyen

Secretary

BirdLife Trogons Bird Club

UPCOMING OUTLING - Bird Ringing, 6 November 2016 @ 05:30

Dear Members

Black-backed Puffback

Sunday 6 November 2016  BIRDLIFE TROGONS will be bird ringing with Andrew & Ivan Pickles at their home venue (first net inspection 05:30).  Bring cameras, chairs,  breakfast & if you wish to go to Andrew & Ivan's afterwards, something to braai for lunch

 

ALL WELCOME. There is a R20pp charge for non-members of Birdlife Trogons.

Please let Andrew know on 082 338 3302 if you will be attending the outing.

Outings may be cancelled due to weather.  Phone Andrew Pickles before setting off.  For further details & directions telephone* Andrew or visit the blog  www.birdlifetrogons.blogspot.com.     ** Please note we cannot respond to text messages or “call me” requests.

Directions:  Take the Umzumbe/Fairview Mission turn-off from the R102. Travel +/-250m to a “T” Junction and turn right, continue for 2.1km’s to another “T”Junction and turn right (now on a dirt road), after 1.2km the road forks take the left hand fork (D150) up the hill, from this fork measure 900m and turn right onto the farm. Follow the road and keep left until you see the bakkie at the workshops.

Kind regards

Hazel van Rooyen

Secretary

BirdLife Trogons Bird Club

Bird Ringing Report - Umdoni Park, Pennington, 7 August 2016

Attending: Andrew & Ivan Pickles, Liz Blomeyer, Peter Vos, Stanley Gengan, Sandy Olver, Johan Snyman, Nigel & Trish Stainbank, Andrew Maree, Stan & Val Culley, Peter Woolcock, Graham & Sue Salthouse, Caryl Lowe, Jody & Talitha Main-Baillie, Hawkes family, Lennart Erikssen, Bob & Hazel van Rooyen 

Grey Waxbill

Common Waxbill

Umdoni Park is one of our favourite birding venues and Andrew obtained permission from Pennington Conservancy to erect his nets, in the hope of ringing some different species.  Johan Snyman from Centurion, who was Andrew’s mentor, was down on holiday with all his equipment and joined in.  We had a good turnout of 23 spectators, half from the Conservancy locality who find Andrew’s regular “hunting” grounds in Umzumbe a bit too far to travel to.  Later in the morning a father had got word that we were in the vicinity and brought his little girl to have a close-up look at the birds.

Andrew showing differences in male & female Terrestrial Brownbuls

Neddicky

Fascinating!

It was a slow but steady morning bird-wise but turned out to be a most pleasant day and a few of us stayed behind to have a picnic at the Environmental Centre.

Thank you Pennington Conservancy.  We will be back.

Ashy Flycatcher enjoying a bath at the Environmental Centre

(All photos property of Hazel van Rooyen)

UPCOMING OUTING: 7 August 2016 - Bird ringing at Umdoni Park, Pennington

Dear Members

 

Sunday 7 August at 6.30am  BIRDLIFE TROGONS will visit Umdoni, Pennington where Andrew & Ivan Pickles will be bird ringing.  Bring cameras, chairs, and breakfast.  Mark Brown has previously done some extensive ringing in this reserve so perhaps we could get some of his ringed birds. There are always plenty of birds to see here so those who want to are free to walk any of the walking trails through the forest.   (Sorry, no braai afterwards).  

Directions

Take the N2 towards Durban – take exit 93 for R102 toward Sezela.  Turn right onto R102.  Travel 4.8km then turn right into Pennington Drive.

After 655m turn right into Minerva Avenue.  Continue straight to Umdoni Park entrance, enter the boom gate;  bear right (west) at the sign for 'Enviro Centre';

(Set GPS to DD MM SS.S  =  S30 23 32.2   E30 41 21.7) follow the dirt road (cautiously, especially in the dark, watching for Blue Duiker, Bushbuck, Genets and Caracal crossing) past the Enviro Centre until you reach Andrew's "bird ringing" signs he'll place to the left of the road.

ALL WELCOME. There is a R20pp charge for non-members of Birdlife Trogons.

Please let Andrew know on 082 338 3302 if you will be attending the outing.

Outings may be cancelled due to weather.  To check, phone Andrew Pickles before setting off.  For further details & directions telephone* Andrew or visit the blog  www.birdlifetrogons.blogspot.com.     ** Please note we cannot respond to text messages or “call me” requests.

See you there!

Hazel van Rooyen

Secretary

BirdLife Trogons Bird Club

Bird Ringing report, iGwalagwala lower forest, 3 July 2016

Catch of the Day - Knysna Warbler

Yet again another good turnout of 18 people for Andrew's bird ringing session on a cold but bright Sunday morning.  I thought it might be too cold for the birds but they are brave little souls and as usual the first catch was the best.  In total 32 birds were caught, 16 new and 16 were recaptures.  

The diminutive Knysna Warbler was a recapture from the previous session. 

iGwalagwala Forest

Spotted Ground Thrush

Brown Scrub-Robin

Chorister Robin-Chat

Lemon Dove

All photos property of Hazel van Rooyen

BIRD RINGING REPORT - iGwalagwala bottom forest with Andrew Pickles - 5 June 2016

 

Knysna Warbler

Attendees: Andrew Pickles, Ivan Pickles, Liz Blomeyer, Carol Lowe, Ron Whitham, Pete Woolcock, James Holness, Andrew and Riki Maree, Bob Hobbes, Irene and Eric Strydom, Sandy Olver, Graham and Sue Salthouse, Robin Eccles, Hanli Kloppers and Herbie and Jeanette Osbourne (19)

Andrew and his team once again ventured out at 4am, against unfavourable weather warnings, erecting 280m of nets before 6am when the first people started to arrive.  He drew an excellent crowd of 18 people which included a contingent all the way from Pennington Conservancy, Scottburgh.

His “special” of the day was a Knysna Warbler about which he had this to say.  "So one of today's highlights at the ringing was this recapture of a Knysna Warbler that was ringed by a good friend of mine Johan Snyman in the same forest on 21/09/2014, almost 2 years ago, this is a bird that was thought to be extinct from KZN until some were discovered in Mbumbazi Nature Reserve near Paddock. This is the third location where I have caught and ringed them on the South Coast, all in indigenous forest patches on sugar cane farms. To confirm the identity of this bird today we played the call from the Roberts Multimedia and the response from the bird was immediate".

Other specials were a male African Goshawk recapture and an adult male Green Twinspot, named Andrew tells us, because each feather has a double spot.

In total 33 birds were caught consisting of 10 recaptures and 23 new birds.

Birds ringed:

• 1 Tambourine Dove
• 1 Lemon Dove
• 2 Chorister Robin-Chat
• 4 Red-Capped Robin-Chat
• 3 Brown Scrub-Robin
• 1 Greenbacked Cameroptera
• 5 Olive Sunbird
• 1 Collared Sunbird
• 5 Green Twinspot (4 imm and 1 ad male)

Recaptures were all from 2014 or 2015 so nothing much in longevity for them, the 2 best are the Goshawk and Warbler

• 2 Brown Scrub-Robin
• 1 Chorister Robin-Chat, interesting as they are a winter visitor so they come back to the same forest
• 1 Squaretailed Drongo
• 2 Red-Capped Robin-Chat
• 1 Knysna Warbler, one of only 18 birds ever ringed and the 4th ever recaptured, ringed in Sept 2014 at the same spot
• 1 African Goshawk
• 1 Cape Robin-Chat
• 1 Terrestrial Brownbul

  Thanks Andrew and Team for all your hard work.