25th November 2007

The river level is falling fast, leaving behind a completely new pattern of sandbanks, mudflats and sand islands.

There is “creeper mania” going on down on the riverbank, with an amazingly varied collection of different creepers venturing out over the bare sand and mud, reclaiming the bare earth and turning it green. I like seeing the different shaped leaves, and the endless different shades of green, and of course the flowers – each one as delicate and intricate as the next.

We went back to the Hammerkop nest on the Mtito River today, just below our “dam”. You could see the birds had been doing more work on the nest, adding more mud (they coat the inside of the nest with mud), but apart from one Hammerkop flying over once at about 5.30pm, the pair were nowhere to be seen. However, there is another bird nesting in the same doum palm tree – further up the left hand fork where the Hammerkop nest is, is a hole in the trunk where a Spot-flanked Barbet is nesting. You could see the Barbet’s head poking out of the hole, and the other parent flying around. The Glossy Starling, which kept landing just above the nest hole was upsetting the Barbet, which swiftly retreated into its hole every time the Starling landed above it – in fact, the Starling would pose no threat to the Barbet but perhaps the disturbance was an inconvenience nonetheless.

The Grey Hornbills were calling and feeding in the trees all around, and I added yet another new bird species to my list, for there was a flock of Golden Breasted Starlings flying around too. I did not manage to get a shot of them, which was unfortunate, for they are rather striking birds, with their long tails and bright blue feathers contrasting with an impossibly bright golden yellow breast.

In fact, I have added a few new birds to my Kulafumbi Bird List today – in addition to the Starlings, we also saw a Broad-billed Roller (which looked like it might be nesting in one of the large Baobab trees), the African Cuckoo, and – we think – the European Cuckoo too.

On the subject of Cuckoos, we finally managed to get a clear photo of the Jacobin (or Black and White) Cuckoo, which was great…better than my first attempt, when the birds first arrived in the area on their annual migration.

The Orange Bellied Parrots were screeching and feeding all around us at the dam too, but were difficult to photograph against the bright sky and the low afternoon sun directly behind them. They are the most extraordinary coloured birds too – their shocking orange bellies contrasting with the bright green of the trees which they fly through at break-neck, image-blurring speed.

I photographed a necklace of frogs’ eggs which had been laid in the ever-so-slightly flowing Mtito (normally these would be laid in completely stagnant water).

The Vervet Monkeys were there too, checking us out from the cover of the riverine trees…and then, just as a final treat, as we rounded the final bend on our way back to the house, there was the juvenile Martial Eagle, in one of its familiar perches, catching the evening sun beautifully. What an impressive eagle it is, even before it acquires its adult colouring. The youngster had obviously had a good meal recently, for you could clearly see its full crop.

Earlier in the day, we went looking for Terminalia flowers, for these are a mystery to us. We see the bright green leaves of the terminalia orbicularis trees, and then we see the seed pods, so distinctive with their "wings" which are almost transparent in backlighting...but what of the flower? Where is it, and what does it look like? We have never seen the flowers, and I'm having problems finding any information on them. Can anyone else shed any light on this?

While we were investigating the Terminalia grove, I photographed the adventurous patterns made by the foraging termites, spreading out across the road. Did you know that in the Tsavo ecosystem each year, as a species, termites overall consume a greater vegetation mass than elephants do? Not a bad statistic for an ant.