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Thursday, July 22, 2010
Igombe dam, Tabora
Where to stay in / near Lushoto ?
what's the latest info for backpack birding in the Usambara mts.
where to stay in / near Lushoto ? daladalas to Magambo FR and even to Shagyo and Shume ??? what about Mazumbai, must still be good birding there.
then where to stay near Amani and how to get to the lowland forest in the Sigi-Segoma area such as Kambai.
any contacts at Muller's or another lodge that would appreciate Valery training their bird guide(s).
answers please from those of you that know.
Neil
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
End of August I'll be in the Usambaras for holidays with a friend coming for birding from Europe. Any place you can advise me where I can stay (low budget) and walk daily (we'll be there 10 days) to the forest is search for specials? All endemics (from Long-billed Tailorbirds to Usambara Eagle-Owl) and forest birds interest me, as I need most of them in photo (for the theoretical lessons of my training).
Valery.
where to stay in / near Lushoto ? daladalas to Magambo FR and even to Shagyo and Shume ??? what about Mazumbai, must still be good birding there.
then where to stay near Amani and how to get to the lowland forest in the Sigi-Segoma area such as Kambai.
any contacts at Muller's or another lodge that would appreciate Valery training their bird guide(s).
answers please from those of you that know.
Neil
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
End of August I'll be in the Usambaras for holidays with a friend coming for birding from Europe. Any place you can advise me where I can stay (low budget) and walk daily (we'll be there 10 days) to the forest is search for specials? All endemics (from Long-billed Tailorbirds to Usambara Eagle-Owl) and forest birds interest me, as I need most of them in photo (for the theoretical lessons of my training).
Valery.
Aliens are tough adversaries
Please be warned: This is, without a shadow of doubt, what Tanzania will
face if the government does not act immediately against Parthenium and
chromoleana, both recently found in the country. We urgently need an early
detection rapid response initiative to prevent the disaster that is facing
Swaziland.
Regards
Sue
MBABANE, 8 June (IRIN) - The effects of Cyclone Demonia are still being
felt a quarter of a century after it ripped through landlocked
Swaziland. The once-in-a-generation storm system swept in from the
Indian Ocean and across neighbouring Mozambique, devastating
infrastructure and sowing death among the Swazis, but its lasting legacy
was the alien plant seeds that the winds carried.
Unnoticed at first, the demonia weed (Parthenium hysterophorus),
colloquially named for the cyclone, has decimated indigenous hunting
areas that people relied on for game, as well as the recently
established community nature reserves that hoped to use wildlife as a
tourism drawcard.
Demonia is native to Mexico, Central and South America; on the Indian
Ocean island of Reunion, where the Swazi seeds are thought to have come
from, demonia is known as camomille z'oiseaux.
It grows up to 1.5 metres tall and can create severe allergic
reactions among humans. "The Demonia weed releases an irritating
chemical that animals find repellent; wherever the weed has taken root,
game animals vacate," botanist Linda Dobson told IRIN.
The invasive plants are worsening food insecurity in a country where
about one-fifth of the roughly one million people depend on food aid.
"Areas which were pristine twenty years ago have been overrun by
invasives," Dobson said. This pushes up the costs of agriculture because
resources are diverted to keep clearing arable land.
"We have a huge alien invader problem here in Swaziland. They bring
with them an increased risk of catastrophic events, such as floods and
landslides; they are hindering farmers' ability to produce crops and
raise cattle," Dobson said.
The Natural History Society of Swaziland has noted invasive plant
species, such as the triffid weed - Chromolaena odorata, an invasive
species from Central America that spreads rapidly, smothering local
indigenous plants - has colonized the country's lowveld, leading to
regions becoming devoid of indigenous antelope.
The noxious triffid weed, known locally as sandanezwe, has been the
subject of government information campaigns. "The problem with
sandanezwe is that it is toxic to cattle, but it has taken over grazing
areas. With nothing to eat the cattle starve," Andrew Dlamini, a field
extension officer in charge of community education at the Ministry of
Agriculture, told IRIN.
In 2009 a programme was launched to eliminate sandanezwe from
government-owned farms, but it became mired in allegations of corruption
and was suspended in late 2009, but others have pointed to the
stubbornness of the triffid as the cause.
"It is not enough to cut it [the triffid weed] - it has to be dug out
and burned; otherwise, it is like a zombie that keeps coming back to
life again and again. Some people in government did not understand this,
and when the weed returned to crop-growing areas that had supposedly
been cleared of sandanezwe, they blamed it on incompetence or
corruption," an agriculture ministry researcher, who declined to be
named, told IRIN.
"Its seeds are viable for a half a century, and are brought to life by
fire - that is why the triffid weed has been so successful at taking
over the northern highveld, because those hills are burned by bush fires
twice a year."
Cultural historian Jabulani Ndwandwe commented: "Swazis ... were
unprepared when nature started behaving in ways no one understood, and
strange plants took over the grazing lands and waterways."
The water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes), originally imported into
South Africa from South America to beautify artificial ponds, found its
way into the ecosystem and spread across the border into Swaziland.
"These 'water weeds' literally choke rivers by removing nutrients,
because as they spread out they block sunlight. Everything below them
dies. Their seeds are viable for up to 30 years, and can lie dormant.
You look at a lake covered by hyacinths and it appears as a green field;
the fish are gone, which further reduces Swazis' food supply, and the
water quality is affected," Dlamini said.
Zinde Mthimkhulu, Senior Water Engineer and Hydrologist at the
Ministry of Natural Resources, told IRIN that invasives like eucalyptus
trees, which can consume 1,000 litres of water each day, were a threat
to the water table. "The deep-rooted invasives pose a problem because
Swazis depend on boreholes during the dry months and the invasives
compete for aquifers."
Mthimkhulu said a national policy was needed to police invasive plants
in the water supply, but the necessary surveys and studies to inform any
such policy were lacking.
jh/go/he[ENDS]
© IRIN. All rights reserved. More humanitarian news and analysis:
http://www.irinnews.org
face if the government does not act immediately against Parthenium and
chromoleana, both recently found in the country. We urgently need an early
detection rapid response initiative to prevent the disaster that is facing
Swaziland.
Regards
Sue
MBABANE, 8 June (IRIN) - The effects of Cyclone Demonia are still being
felt a quarter of a century after it ripped through landlocked
Swaziland. The once-in-a-generation storm system swept in from the
Indian Ocean and across neighbouring Mozambique, devastating
infrastructure and sowing death among the Swazis, but its lasting legacy
was the alien plant seeds that the winds carried.
Unnoticed at first, the demonia weed (Parthenium hysterophorus),
colloquially named for the cyclone, has decimated indigenous hunting
areas that people relied on for game, as well as the recently
established community nature reserves that hoped to use wildlife as a
tourism drawcard.
Demonia is native to Mexico, Central and South America; on the Indian
Ocean island of Reunion, where the Swazi seeds are thought to have come
from, demonia is known as camomille z'oiseaux.
It grows up to 1.5 metres tall and can create severe allergic
reactions among humans. "The Demonia weed releases an irritating
chemical that animals find repellent; wherever the weed has taken root,
game animals vacate," botanist Linda Dobson told IRIN.
The invasive plants are worsening food insecurity in a country where
about one-fifth of the roughly one million people depend on food aid.
"Areas which were pristine twenty years ago have been overrun by
invasives," Dobson said. This pushes up the costs of agriculture because
resources are diverted to keep clearing arable land.
"We have a huge alien invader problem here in Swaziland. They bring
with them an increased risk of catastrophic events, such as floods and
landslides; they are hindering farmers' ability to produce crops and
raise cattle," Dobson said.
The Natural History Society of Swaziland has noted invasive plant
species, such as the triffid weed - Chromolaena odorata, an invasive
species from Central America that spreads rapidly, smothering local
indigenous plants - has colonized the country's lowveld, leading to
regions becoming devoid of indigenous antelope.
The noxious triffid weed, known locally as sandanezwe, has been the
subject of government information campaigns. "The problem with
sandanezwe is that it is toxic to cattle, but it has taken over grazing
areas. With nothing to eat the cattle starve," Andrew Dlamini, a field
extension officer in charge of community education at the Ministry of
Agriculture, told IRIN.
In 2009 a programme was launched to eliminate sandanezwe from
government-owned farms, but it became mired in allegations of corruption
and was suspended in late 2009, but others have pointed to the
stubbornness of the triffid as the cause.
"It is not enough to cut it [the triffid weed] - it has to be dug out
and burned; otherwise, it is like a zombie that keeps coming back to
life again and again. Some people in government did not understand this,
and when the weed returned to crop-growing areas that had supposedly
been cleared of sandanezwe, they blamed it on incompetence or
corruption," an agriculture ministry researcher, who declined to be
named, told IRIN.
"Its seeds are viable for a half a century, and are brought to life by
fire - that is why the triffid weed has been so successful at taking
over the northern highveld, because those hills are burned by bush fires
twice a year."
Cultural historian Jabulani Ndwandwe commented: "Swazis ... were
unprepared when nature started behaving in ways no one understood, and
strange plants took over the grazing lands and waterways."
The water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes), originally imported into
South Africa from South America to beautify artificial ponds, found its
way into the ecosystem and spread across the border into Swaziland.
"These 'water weeds' literally choke rivers by removing nutrients,
because as they spread out they block sunlight. Everything below them
dies. Their seeds are viable for up to 30 years, and can lie dormant.
You look at a lake covered by hyacinths and it appears as a green field;
the fish are gone, which further reduces Swazis' food supply, and the
water quality is affected," Dlamini said.
Zinde Mthimkhulu, Senior Water Engineer and Hydrologist at the
Ministry of Natural Resources, told IRIN that invasives like eucalyptus
trees, which can consume 1,000 litres of water each day, were a threat
to the water table. "The deep-rooted invasives pose a problem because
Swazis depend on boreholes during the dry months and the invasives
compete for aquifers."
Mthimkhulu said a national policy was needed to police invasive plants
in the water supply, but the necessary surveys and studies to inform any
such policy were lacking.
jh/go/he[ENDS]
© IRIN. All rights reserved. More humanitarian news and analysis:
http://www.irinnews.org
Friday, July 9, 2010
Coucals - do they meet?
Bit of duplication here but what to do. Having looked at the two coucals and raised a few questions I thought I should look at them all and send them to our group in search of answers, there are, as ever, quite a few required.So..here are the latest White-browed and Burchell's to begin with. Because burchelli was treated as a race in Britton (1980) we still have to move quite a few coastal records from superciliosus to this species.
Neil
The nightjars - measuering Primaries
From the just sent paper please note the "easy" separation of the poliocephalus , ruwenzorii , guttifer by measureing the P's!!!
P10-P8 are all long in guttifer and the (P7 and) P6 are shorter.
P10 P9 P8 P7 P6
C. poliocephalus 143.6±4.5 (129-153) 60 152.3±4.1 (139-162) 57 152.3±4.3 (137-162) 59 145.6±4.7 (132-158) 60 124.5±4.1 (115-134) 60
C. r. ruwenzorii 145.3±4.8 (130-155) 40 154.5±4.9 (141-163) 40 154.8±4.7 (144-163) 40 147.3±4.9 (136-156) 40 126.8±5.0 (116-139) 39
C. r. guttifer 146.5±2.9 (141-150) 8 155.6±3.1 (151-162) 8 156.1±2.6 (151-161) 9 145.6±3.5 (139-151) 8 123.0±3.3 (116-127) 9
Louis
P10-P8 are all long in guttifer and the (P7 and) P6 are shorter.
P10 P9 P8 P7 P6
C. poliocephalus 143.6±4.5 (129-153) 60 152.3±4.1 (139-162) 57 152.3±4.3 (137-162) 59 145.6±4.7 (132-158) 60 124.5±4.1 (115-134) 60
C. r. ruwenzorii 145.3±4.8 (130-155) 40 154.5±4.9 (141-163) 40 154.8±4.7 (144-163) 40 147.3±4.9 (136-156) 40 126.8±5.0 (116-139) 39
C. r. guttifer 146.5±2.9 (141-150) 8 155.6±3.1 (151-162) 8 156.1±2.6 (151-161) 9 145.6±3.5 (139-151) 8 123.0±3.3 (116-127) 9
Louis
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
MORE FOR THE OLIVE/MOUNTAIN THRUSH COLLECTION.
Dear Neil and Liz,
Here are some more thrushes for the fast growing collection.
Listen to the sounds from Uluguru, by Brian Finch
1. ROEHLI from the Magamba Sawmill Road, West Usambaras.
2. Now this bird is an OLDEANI from Sopa Lodge, Ngorongoro. If you
read the description of Oldeani from the Handbook, you will find that
it has little in common with this bird. Either Oldeani is a suspect
race, or birds on the Crater Rim are not oldeani.
3. This is a nominate from 10,000 feet on Mt Kenya in the bamboo zone.
Not a great difference between this and the bird from the Crater Rim.
4. This is the form around Nairobi, it is richer than the Mt Kenya
birds though they are the same race.
5. These are three different calls from the bird on the Ulugurus,
treated in the Handbook as Nyikae. The bird was almost black head to
chest, hardly any relief on the throat. Dark below but somewhat
browner. In flight the rusty flanks were very conspicuous on the
almost uniformly dark bird. I can find no illustrations or images of
nyikae. Whilst roehli is dark, “nyikae” on Uluguru appears as black as
helleri from Taita Hills. I hope that someone can find a use for this.
As you can hear it is very strong and melodic.
Best for now
Here are some more thrushes for the fast growing collection.
Listen to the sounds from Uluguru, by Brian Finch
1. ROEHLI from the Magamba Sawmill Road, West Usambaras.
2. Now this bird is an OLDEANI from Sopa Lodge, Ngorongoro. If you
read the description of Oldeani from the Handbook, you will find that
it has little in common with this bird. Either Oldeani is a suspect
race, or birds on the Crater Rim are not oldeani.
3. This is a nominate from 10,000 feet on Mt Kenya in the bamboo zone.
Not a great difference between this and the bird from the Crater Rim.
4. This is the form around Nairobi, it is richer than the Mt Kenya
birds though they are the same race.
5. These are three different calls from the bird on the Ulugurus,
treated in the Handbook as Nyikae. The bird was almost black head to
chest, hardly any relief on the throat. Dark below but somewhat
browner. In flight the rusty flanks were very conspicuous on the
almost uniformly dark bird. I can find no illustrations or images of
nyikae. Whilst roehli is dark, “nyikae” on Uluguru appears as black as
helleri from Taita Hills. I hope that someone can find a use for this.
As you can hear it is very strong and melodic.
Best for now
Brian
Friday, July 2, 2010
African Bare-Eyed Thrush in Ruaha
From: David Erickson
Hello,
I was doing fieldwork for my masters in and around Ruaha.
Part of the project I was working on involved camera traps (Targeting Mammals). I am currently sorting through all the photos. I came across a picture of a Turdus Thrush, and from the book I have it looks like an African Bare-Eyed Thrush. The "Birds of East Africa" book I have does not show this species in the Ruaha area so I thought I'd pass it along to the TZ bird atlas for a look (Two pics are attached to this email). Hopefully it's useful.
Cheers,
Dave Erickson
tks David
as you can see from this latest map there have been records from the Ruaha ecosystem but not many so yours are most welcome.
this bird is moving, expanding its range westwards. climate change...who knows !!!!
Neil
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