Bird ringing at Nuwejaars Wetlands SMA : 7 to 12 October 2024
This was the first bird ringing visit to the Nuwejaars Wetlands SMA (Special Management Area). Our objective was to start the process of finding good ringing si...
Author: Les Underhill
Prof Les Underhill was Director of the Animal Demography Unit (ADU) at the University of Cape Town from its start in 1991 until he retired. Although citizen science in biology is Les’s passion, his academic background is in mathematical statistics. He was awarded his PhD in abstract multivariate analyses in 1973 at UCT and what he likes to say about his PhD is that he solved a problem that no one has ever had. He soon grasped that this was not the field to which he wanted to devote his life, so he retrained himself as an applied statistician, solving real-world problems.
Bird ringing at Nuwejaars Wetlands SMA : 19 to 23 September 2025
We are reporting on our eighth bird ringing expedition to the Nuwejaars Wetlands. We were here from Friday 19 to Tuesday 23 September 2025, four nights. As with...
Arrival and peak abundance of Barn Swallows in three regions of South Africa in relation to climate indices, deduced from SABAP2 data
A paper on the migration of Barn Swallows has been published Open Access in the journal Birds. Publication date was 9 September 2025. The authors, title and jou...
Bird ringing at Botuin, Vanrhynsdorp : 23 to 27 August 2025
We were bird ringing at Botuin, Vanrhynsdorp, at the peak of the spring wildflower season. We didn’t do any dedicated trips to the special touristy flower...
Bird ringing at Alte Kalköfen Bird Observatory : 5 to 12 February 2025
Where is the Alte Kalköfen Bird Observatory? The Alte Kalköfen Bird Observatory is in southern Namibia, along the B4, the main road between Keetmanshoop, via Au...
Bird ringing at Nuwejaars Wetlands SMA : 9 to 14 August 2025
This is a report on our seventh bird ringing expedition to the Nuwejaars Wetlands. We were here from Saturday 9 to Thursday 14 August 2025, five nights. This se...
Bird ringing and brunch at Zandvlei : 21 December 2024
On Saturday 21 December 2024, we invited all the bird ringers in Cape Town to celebrate a year of enjoying birds. It was an special opportunity for the bird rin...
Bird ringing at Botuin, Vanrhynsdorp : 29 March to 4 April 2025
We had neglected our Vanrhynsdorp ringing sites since November last year, so this visit was overdue! You can read the report on that trip here. This blog summar...
Researcher heaven : publications on biodiversity on Robben Island
Imagine. You are a new postgraduate student on Robben Island. You know you have lots of predecessors, and that you need to read up on all the research has alrea...
Bird ringing course at New Holme : 9 to 15 September 2024
The BDI’s ninth bird ringing course, and the fourth at New Holme, was held at the New Holme Nature Lodge, in the heart of the Karoo, between Hanover and C...