Ringing - Fynbos birdlife

The 10 most ringed species are shown below, and these can be expected to be caught on most Fynbos bird ringing / bird banding expeditions.

Cape White-eye (Zosterops virens),
Cape Weaver (Ploceus capensis),
Southern Masked-Weaver (Ploceus velatus),
Cape Robin-Chat (Cossypha caffra),
Yellow Bishop (Euplectes capensis),
Cape Bulbul (Pycnonotus capensis),
Southern Red Bishop (Euplectes orix),
Olive Thrush (Turdus olivaceus),
Red-faced Mousebird (Urocolius indicus).

Additional interesting species that have been caught include:

Cape Batis (Batis capensis),
Fiscal Flycatcher (Sigelus silens),
Common Fiscal (Lanius collaris),
Swee Waxbill (Coccopygia melanotis),
Karoo Prinia (Prinia maculosa),
White-backed Mousebird (Colius colius),
Cardinal Woodpecker (Dendropicos fuscescens),
Olive Thrush (Turdus olivaceus),
Bar-throated Apalis (Apalis thoracica),
Southern Double-collared Sunbird (Cinnyris chalybeus),
Malachite Sunbird (Nectarinia famosa).

There is still potential for many other interesting species, especially Cape Sugarbird (Promerops cafer).

Find out more about the expeditions:

General:

Fynbos expedition:

Bushveld expedition:

Ringing at Sonop farm, Paardeberg
April 29, 2019
Paardeberg Inselberg is surrounded by vineyards and farms, but patches of fynbos, trees, farm dams, homestead gardens provide varied habitat and good diversity of birds. Ringing has been conducted at Bowwood farm and Fynbos Estate. On 27 April 2019 Loutjie Steenberg, Taylyn Risi and I ringed on Sonop farm and caught 43 birds of 13 species. Three […]
Greedy southern pale chanting goshawk
April 20, 2019
Franke-Bryson U. 2019. Greedy southern pale chanting goshawk Melierax canorus. Biodiversity Observations 10.8:1-7 Biodiversity Observations is an open access electronic journal published by the Animal Demography Unit at the University of Cape Town. This HTML version of this manuscript is hosted by the Biodiversity and Development Institute. […]
White-throated Swallows in Cape Town
April 17, 2019
White-throated Swallows are common in Cape Town in the summer months, building their nests under the multiple bridges that cross canals and rivers. They migrate north in Africa for the wet winter. Ringing of these swallows (both adults and nestlings) has been opportunistic most of the time, while ringing weavers in wetlands around Cape Town. […]
Longevities of kingfishers
April 5, 2019
Kingfishers are colourful and interesting, and it is a great pleasure to hold one in the hand (Figure 1). Catching them also provides valuable data, and here longevity data will be highlighted (data that can only reliably be obtained from ringing efforts). There are 10 species in southern Africa, and the greatest longevity record is nearly 9 […]
Establishing a long-term bird ringing site. Part 2: some birds
March 5, 2019
Part 1 of this series described the bird ringing site at Fynbos Estate. This property, partly wine farm and partly nature reserve, is in the northwestern corner of the Paardeberg. The closest town is Malmesbury, in the Swartland region of the Western Cape, north of Cape Town. The bird atlas grid cell into which Fynbos Estate falls is called pentad […]

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