PHunting Round Three - December 2021

The Festive Season is upon us, or is it the Silly Season? All around there is a mad dash in the shops, the queues are long, the smell of fresh hot-cross buns strong. To escape the madness, or perhaps some family members, some individuals have turned to biomapping. Time spent in nature is never wasted and all the more so if you can contribute to biodiversity conservation!

Round Three of Photo Hunting (i.e. PHunting) kicked off on Saturday 11 December 2021 and ran until midnight on Sunday 19 December 2021. Biomappers snapped and mapped the amazing total of 3,979 records! Below is a table summarizing the number of records received, by project, in the Virtual Museum for PHunting Round Three. The table is organized by most to least amount of records received.

VM Project	Record Totals
BirdPix	1884
OdonataMAP	862
LepiMAP	723
TreeMAP	112
ReptileMAP	104
MammalMAP	67
FrogMAP	56
MushroomMAP	55
SpiderMAP	51
PHOWN	22
OrchidMAP	18
ScorpionMAP	9
LacewingMAP	7
FishMAP	4
DungBeetleMAP	3
BOP	1
EchinoMAP	1

12 Observers submitted more than 100 records on African biodiversity. The Top 15 PHunters for Round Three are listed in the table below:

	Observer Name	Total
1	Pieter Cronje	402
2	Mark Liptrot	309
3	Corrie du Toit	279
4	Corne Rautenbach	232
5	Nico Vromant	195
6	M. Booysen	194
7	Christopher Small	185
8	Les Underhill	143
9	Lia Steen	138
10	Lance Robinson	134
11	Crystelle Wilson	123
12	Karis Daniel	120
13	Pieter La Grange	93
14	Diana Russell	93
15	Mary Lindsay	85

For BirdPix, the bulk of the records came from South Africa (1,663 records), followed by Zambia (79) and Uganda (55). We also received records from Angola, Botswana, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia and Zimbabwe.

The bird species most recorded? The Southern Black-Flycatcher Melaenornis pammelaina (24 records) took first place with Egyptian Goose Alopochen aegyptiacus (20 records) and Village Weaver Ploceus cucullatus in third with 19 records. All in all 480 different bird species were phunted! This number reflects only the records that have been identified by the expert panel thus far, but our experts make quick work of getting identifications verified.

Southern Black-Flycatcher *Melaenornis pammelaina* – BirdPix record by Andre Harmse

Below is a table of the top ten birds recorded during the third round of Phunting.

	Scientific Name	Common Name	Records Total
1	Melaenornis pammelaina	Southern Black-Flycatcher	24
2	Alopochen aegyptiacus	Egyptian Goose	20
3	Ploceus cucullatus	Village Weaver	19
4	Columba guinea	Speckled Pigeon	18
5	Passer melanurus	Cape Sparrow	18
6	Bostrychia hagedash	Hadeda Ibis	18
7	Streptopelia senegalensis	Laughing Dove	16
8	Lonchura cucullatus	Bronze Mannikin	15
9	Motacilla capensis	Cape Wagtail	15
10	Pycnonotus tricolor	Dark-capped Bulbul	15

In the OdonataMAP section of the Virtual Museum we received records from five countries: Cameroon, Namibia, South Africa, Uganda, and Zambia. From the records that have been identified to date, 105 different species were recorded.

Russet Dropwing *Trithemis pluvialis* – OdonataMAP record by Hesmarie Els

The Red-veined Dropwing Trithemis arteriosa was most frequently recorded with 50 records, followed by the Broad Scarlet Crocothemis erythraea (45) and Tropical Bluetail Ischnura senegalensis (39). Corrie du Toit was the top OdonataMAPper, managing to submit 233 dragonfly and damselfly records for PHunting Round Three.

Below is a table of the top ten odonates recorded during the third round of Phunting.

	Scientific Name	Common Name	Records Total
1	Trithemis arteriosa	Red-veined Dropwing	50
2	Crocothemis erythraea	Broad Scarlet	45
3	Ischnura senegalensis	Tropical Bluetail	39
4	Ceriagrion glabrum	Common Citril	35
5	Orthetrum capicola	Cape Skimmer	34
6	Nesciothemis farinosa	Eastern Blacktail	26
7	Brachythemis leucosticta	Southern Banded Groundling	24
8	Orthetrum julia	Julia Skimmer	23
9	Sympetrum fonscolombii	Red-veined Darter or Nomad	23
10	Trithemis kirbyi	Orange-winged Dropwing	21

LepiMAPpers were also out in full force for the third round of photo hunting, snapping and mapping a total of 723 butterflies and moths. Phunting trophies from all over Africa were uploaded to the LepiMAP section of the Virtual Museum. For South Africa, most of the records came from KwaZulu-Natal Province (188), followed by the Western Cape (66) and the North West Province on 22 records.

Large Striped Swordtail *Graphium antheus* – LepiMAP record by Daryl de Beer

From the 723 records submitted, the expert panel has identified 221 different species thus far! The little African Grass Blue Zizeeria knysna knysna ended up being the most photogenic with 30 records. Next in line was the African Veined White Belenois gidica abyssinica (17 records) and tied for third was the White-barred Telchinia Telchinia encedon encedon and Large Striped Swordtail Graphium antheus both with 13 records. See the table below for the LepiMAP top ten for the third round of Phunting.

	Scientific Name	Common Name	Records Total
1	Zizeeria knysna knysna	African grass blue	30
2	Belenois gidica abyssinica	African veined white	17
3	Telchinia encedon encedon	White-barred telchinia	13
4	Graphium antheus	Large striped swordtail	13
5	Belenois creona severina	African Caper White	12
6	Azanus moriqua	Black-bordered Babul Blue	11
7	Bicyclus safitza safitza	Black-haired Bush Brown	11
8	Azanus jesous	Topaz Babul Blue	10
9	Lampides boeticus	Pea Blue	10
10	Danaus chrysippus orientis	African Plain Tiger	10

There are many other sections of the Virtual Museum and we encourage you to keep an eye out for these critters too. We are mapping everything from scorpions to frogs to mammals. So what are you waiting for? Grab your camera (or cellphone) and get snapping and mapping!

PHunting Round Four starts on Saturday 08 January 2022 🙂 Starting the New Year off with a biodiversity bang!