Cover image of African Rail by Johan Heyns – Marievale Bird Sanctuary, Gauteng
Rails belong to the Family: RALLIDAE. This family also includes Crakes, Swamphens, Flufftails, Gallinules, Moorhens and Coots etc. Their physiology is diverse, but most have laterally compressed bodies, short tails, short rounded wings and well developed legs and feet. The bill structure is variable. Most birds in this family inhabit wetlands or forest undergrowth and are usually vocal and highly secretive.
Identification
The African Rail is a fairly large and striking rallid. The sexes differ slightly in plumage colouration and males are slightly larger than females.
African RailRallus caerulescens Port Edward, KwaZulu-Natal Photo by Lia Steen
Adult males have dark brown upperparts, including the crown, hind-neck, back, wings, rump, and tail. The forehead and the sides of the head are dark grey, and the chin and throat are white. The front and sides of the neck and the breast are dusky grey. The flanks, thighs, belly, and undertail coverts are black with narrow white barring. The long, slender, and slightly decurved bill is bright red. The eyes are dark red, and the legs and feet are bright red with long toes.
Adult females resemble males but have shorter bills, and their bodies are less distinctly marked. Juveniles are darker and browner below than the adults, and they have blackish (not red) bills and dark brown legs and feet.
African RailRallus caerulescens Nuwejaars Wetland Special Management Area, Western Cape Photo by Dieter Oschadleus
If clearly seen, the African Rail is unlikely to be confused with any other southern African bird species. However, an obscured view or a fleeting glimpse may lead to confusion with the African Crake (Crex egregaria). Both carry similar patterning and colouration, but the African Crake is smaller and has black streaking on the back and grey legs. The African Crake also has a short grey bill with a red base.
Status and Distribution
The African Rail is endemic to sub-Saharan Africa. It is rare in West Africa with several isolated populations across the region. It is also uncommon in the Ethiopian highlands. The main range of the African Rail, where it occurs widely, extends from eastern DRC to central Kenya, and south through eastern and central Africa to the Western Cape province in South Africa.
African RailRallus caerulescens Marievale Bird Sanctuary, Gauteng Photo by Ansie Dee Reis
The African Rail is largely absent from the driest regions of southern Africa, including the Kalahari and Namibia, but with scattered records from the central and north-eastern Karoo. It is locally distributed elsewhere, mainly in the north and east, extending along the littoral to the Western Cape.
Most records come from the higher-lying parts of Zimbabwe, the Okavango and associated wetlands in Botswana and the Caprivi, Gauteng and the northern Free State, KwaZulu-Natal, and the Western Cape Province.
SABAP2 distribution map for African Rail (Rallus caerulescens) – December 2024. Details for map interpretation can be found here.
In southern Africa, the African Rail is uncommon to locally common. Its distribution is believed to be largely unchanged. Although the African Rail’s natural habitats are continually being reduced, it is under no immediate threat and can colonise relatively small, artificially created wetland patches. Its range is likely to have increased in parts of the Western Cape.
African RailRallus caerulescens Port Edward, KwaZulu-Natal Photo by Lia Steen
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Habitat
Typical marsh and reedbed habitat. Wakkerstroom, Mpumalanga Photo by Ryan Tippett
The African Rail favours reedbeds (Typhaspp and Phragmites spp) and dense, rank growth in perennial, semi-permanent or temporary swamps and marshes. It also occurs in suitable habitat alongside rivers, streams, pools, dams, pans, and lakes. The African Rail sometimes also inhabits paddy fields, and seasonally wet sugarcane bordering marshes. In southern Africa, the African Rail has been recorded up to 3000m above sea level.
Habitat in the Nuwejaars Wetland Special Management Area, Western Cape Photo by Ryan Tippett
Behaviour
The African Rail is usually found in pairs, although they are sometimes also solitary. They are somewhat crepuscular and are most lively at dusk; however, they are also active throughout the day. More often heard than seen, the African Rail is a retiring and skulking species, but is not shy within the shelter of dense vegetation. They spend most of their time in thick cover, but will on occasion reveal themselves at the edges of reedbeds or tracks through wetlands. They are most vocal during the cooler hours of the day and will occasionally call after dark.
African RailRallus caerulescens Wilderness National Park, Western Cape Photo by Jean Hirons
Within the cover of reedbeds, the African Rail’s movements are jerky, often while raising and flicking its tail. They walk more purposefully in the open, taking quick, long strides. When alarmed, the African Rail stands upright, flattens its plumage, and raises its tail. If a potential predator approaches, they will stand motionless before crouching flat until the threat has passed. The African Rail flies low with dangling legs, and they can also swim competently when needed. They climb well, too, sometimes clambering to the tops of tall reeds.
African Rails bathe in shallow water or over the stems of submerged vegetation in deeper water. Afterwards, they will move to a dry spot where they can sunbathe with the wings slightly spread.
African RailRallus caerulescens West Coast National Park, Western Cape Photo by Colin Summersgill
The African Rail mostly forages in shallow water and in mud at the edges of reedbeds. They will also search for food on floating clumps of water plants, and occasionally on dry ground. They use their long bills to probe deeply into mud or grass tufts and will even plunge their heads and necks into shallow water to catch prey.
The African Rail is omnivorous, and their diet includes a range of insects, earthworms, crabs, spiders, small frogs and tadpoles, small fish, and plant matter, including seeds. They are also known to scavenge when the opportunity arises.
African RailRallus caerulescens Umvoti River, KwaZulu-Natal Photo by Georg Jacobs
The African Rail is a monogamous, solitary nester. Pairs become territorial when breeding, and frequently engage in fights with conspecifics by jumping up and attacking with the bill. Territorial pairs often call in duet. The size of breeding territories varies depending on conditions. In optimal habitat, up to 4 pairs may occupy a single hectare of reedbed.
The nest is a shallow bowl made from the leaves and stems of sedges, Bulrushes, and grasses. It is placed up to 400 mm above the water level and is very well hidden among marsh vegetation. 2 to 6 eggs are laid per clutch. The eggs are creamy-white with brown and grey speckles. Incubation duties are shared by both sexes, and the eggs hatch after 20 days. The newly hatched chicks are precocial and become fully fledged in 6 to 7 weeks.
African RailRallus caerulescens Wilderness National Park, Western Cape Photo by Jean Hirons
Further Resources
Species text adapted from the first Southern African Bird Atlas Project (SABAP1), 1997. That text can be found here.
The use of photographs by Ansie Dee Reis, Colin Summersgill, Dembo Jatta, Dieter Oschadleus, Georg Jacobs, Jean Hirons, Johan Heyns, and Lia Steen is acknowledged. Additional photos by Ryan Tippett.
A list of bird species in this format is available here.
Recommended citation format: Tippett RM. 2026. African Rail Rallus caerulescens. Biodiversity and Development Institute. Available online at https://thebdi.org/2026/01/13/african-rail-rallus-caerulescens/
Saturday. 20 December. was the Open Day for bird ringing. We had two locations arranged for the ringing, so that there was space for everyone. At sunrise, we discovered that we had chosen a day with the same weather conditions as for the analogous event last year: a stiff southeaster.
So we were not hopeful of hugely successful event from the ringing perspective. And so it proved; nevertheless, we did better than last year, from a numbers perspective, by five birds!
The species composition was similar between the two years. One of the Cape Weavers was a retrap from 2021.
Ringing table at Promenade Road …
… and at the end of Lake Road, Frogmore Estate. The two sites are almost exactly 1 km apart, and both have broadly similar reedbed habitats:
… the reedbed at the end of Lake Road, Frogmore Estate.
So it is not surprising that we mistnetted a Malachite Kingfisher at both sites!
African Reed Warbler at Frogmore Estate.
Neither the ringers nor the guineafowl appreciated the wind.
The Red-eyed Doves kept watchful left eyes on ringing proceedings below from the safety of an electrified fortress in Lake Road.
The Frogmore Estate ringers were gathered on the corner of a vacant plot. Under normal circumstances, a Spotted Thick-knee which was simply roosting would have moved off. So it was clearly on guard duty, also keeping an eye on us …
… the mate was incubating two eggs, and screened from view by a combination of a small depression for the nest, and a row of low plants on the road side of the nest:.
The ringing was followed by brunch in Marina da Gama. We got too engrossed in conversations to take photos, so there is no record of the event!
We are all grateful to Richard and Sue Gie for hosting us. Greatly appreciated by everyone present.
Hopefully Saturday, 19 December 2026, the scheduled date of the Third Annual Bird Ringers Open Day, will not be so windy. Go to the last line of the 2026 programme of events!
There is no record of the number of people who attended the Open Day for bird ringing at Grotto Bay, but it was probably roughly 40, both residents and visitors.But we do know that 76 birds of 27 species were handled. There were eight retraps, so the number of birds ringed was 68! The list is near the bottom of this report. This was our third Open Day to the Grotto Bay Private Nature Reserve, and reports on the two previous visits are here (27 May 2023) and here (31 August last year).
Fortunately, in spite of dire and persistent predictions to the contrary, the wind was missing in action. Mist nets hanging like curtains in one of the firebreaks at Grotto Bay.
The wind clearly did not read the forecast that it was supposed to be doing 27 to 30 km per hour in the critical period 05h00 to 08h00, with gusts of 38 to 45 km per hour. It failed to get up and stayed in bed. And for that we were grateful.
The veranda of the Grotto Bay Conservation Centre is a marvellous resource for bird ringing, and for explaining bird ringing.
The Conservation Centre at Grotto Bay is a few hundred metres farther inland from the village itself. Just in front of it is a small wetland. This is the view from the veranda. It was a high-quality day, both weatherwise and action-wise!
Extracting a bird safely and gently from a mist net takes real skill. This white-irised bird is a Layard’s Warbler.
We caught birds at a steady pace, but were never overwhelmed.
The wonderful thing about bird ringing is the opportunity to see birds up close.
This is a young Bokmakierie
Head of Karoo Prinia.
Head of a juvenile Long-billed Crombec.
Adult male Southern Masked Weaver being ringed. The leg is held firmly but gently at the “knee” during this operation, so that it can’t move.
The weaver took advantage of a moment’s lapse in concentration of the ringer! The beak is strong – it weaves nests – and although it can deliver a good pinch, it does not draw blood.
The marie biscuit-coloured eye indicates that this is an adult male Cape Weaver.
Measuring the “total-head length” of a juvenile Yellow Canary with dial calipers. The reading is 25.6 mm. The 20 comes from the yellow part of the calipers. The dial makes one revolution in 10 mm. It is at 5.6 mm. So 20 + 5.6 is 25.6 mm.
There is nothing quite like bird ringing to help develop connectedness to nature.
Daniel is using the gadget which helps us decide on the appropriate ring size for the Malachite Sunbird he has in the ringer’s grip. There will be stories to tell at school on Monday morning.
The fieldguide is open at the Cape Weaver page. This is a remarkable way to learn the identification features of a bird!
Hybrid bulbul?
The morning was invaluable from the social science perspective, in achieving its Open Day objectives! From the natural science perspective, we helped expand the SAFRING database. But the stand-out and intriguing piece of natural science was a bulbul which is possibly (maybe even probably) a hybrid between a Cape Bulbul and an African Red-eyed Bulbul.
Both of these birds had brood patches, and both were adults. The bulbul on the left is Cape Bulbul. We suspect the bird on the right is a hybrid between a Cape Bulbul and an African Red-eyed Bulbul. In the Cape Bulbul, the white cere around the eye is an ellipse, and the eye is at the back end of the ellipse. In this bird, the short axis is 65% of the length of the long axis. For the bird on the right, the short axis is 88% of the length of the long axis, and the eye is almost in the centre of the cere. In African Red-eyed Bulbuls, illustrated below, the cere is bright red, and circular. The colour of the cere of the suspected hybrid is a bit of a mess, a kind of pink intermediate between white and red. The fact that the cere of the bird on the right is more circular than the norm for a Cape Bulbul also adds fuel to the idea that it is a hybrid.
This is an African Red-eyed Bulbul. Chief differences with Cape Bulbul are the circular red cere, the darker head, and the whiter belly.
The suspected hybrid, on the right, has a slightly whiter belly than the Cape Bulbul on the left. Ringers have picked up other examples of suspected hybrids recently. In the northern part of the Western Cape, in the Olifants River valley as far south Citrusdal, most of the bulbuls are now African Red-eyed. There are even records of African Red-eyed Bulbul at Stanford and even at Cape Agulhas; see this paper in Biodiversity Observations.
Here is the list of the 27 species at Grotto Bay, and the number of birds of each species handled.
There is a list of all past BDI ringing events that have reports here. The next ringing event is also an Open Day. It is in Saturday 20 December, with ringing on the western side of Zandvlei, followed by a bring and brunch at Marina da Gama, on the eastern side. Details here. Information about future ringing plans are here.
Thank you
First and foremost, all the visitors want to thank the Grotto Bay Private Nature Reserve for the warm welcome, and the generous hospitality. The muffins, the shortbread, the quiches, …, …, … were amazing and greatly appreciated. Especial thanks to Roy Lawrence, Michelle van Acker, Suzette Vorster, and also to Loutjie Steenberg, who made the original arrangements, but in the end suffered FOMO in being unable to attend. Many of the photographs in this blog are Suzette’s – thank you.
Ringers, plus family and friends, trainees and would-be trainees are invited to the end-of-year event on Saturday 20 December 2025. We will be bird ringing at Zandvlei, then have brunch at Marina da Gama.
We inaugurated this last year, and the report on the event is here.
Networking after the ringing last year!
We will set up a WhatsApp group to communicate final details.
Sunrise is at 05h31 that day. So the ringing will be starting early! Details of times and place(s) will be sent to everyone who responds. You don’t need to come as early as the start of the ringing, and you are even welcome to just come for the brunch! We will set up a WhatsApp group to communicate final details.
Brunch will be a bring and share event. Like it was last year:
In spite of the appearances here, there were lots of people to tackle all the food. Last year, this included an ostrich egg omelette!
This event provides a great opportunity to network, and to make plans for ringing in 2026.
Please contact Sue Gie if you would like to be part of the morning; send an email to susan[at]gie.co.za
The BDI ringing programme for 2026 is here. There is a list of all the events which have reports here.
Bird ringing has made a huge contribution to bird research and bird conservation. This is outlined here.
We have been monitoring the breeding of the African Oystercatchers Haematopos moquini on Robben Island since the summer of 2001/02. We have also monitored their abundance. This blog aims to describe the fieldwork we are doing in the summer of 2025/26. Our target interval between trips is six days, but that sometimes gets adjusted by the weather and other commitments. So this blog ought to be updated at roughly six-day intervals. The most recent visit is on top! Our objective for the summer is to find every oystercatcher nest on the island. At the end of the blog is a list of some of the publications that have emerged from this fieldwork. The papers give more background to the science and conservation objectives.
Fieldwork 10 : 16 and 17 January (in progress)
This fieldtrip had been scheduled for the 15th and 16th. But the sea was unsuitable for operation on the 15th, so we went to the island with the first ferry on the 16th, had a long day’s fieldwork, and continued into the morning of the 17th. It now feels like we have caught up!
This is our first nest actually in Murray’s Bay Harbour. The nest owner is watching from along the edge of the wharf!
This is probably the first nest that we have found on the inland side of the perimeter road. This is a busy spot with Alpha One in the background. Every tourist bus passes this spot twice. The nest has had two eggs since it was discovered on 5 January. So it is about one-third of the way through the 30-day incubation period.
Fieldwork 9 : 10 January 2026 (in progress)
The two-day trip which had been planned for 3 to 4 January was unable to take place because of high winds and no ferries. As luck would have it, it proved impossible to arrange fieldwork before the next planned dates of 9 and 10 January. And then ferries were cancelled on 9 January, and fieldwork was reduced to a day trip on 10 January.
Fieldwork 8 : 27 December 2025 (in progress)
This was a planned one day trip, due to it being in the holiday season.
Dembo Jatta assisted with almost all of the fieldwork up to this trip, and was the leader of fieldwork in the northern half of the island. This was his last trip before starting a PhD at Wageningen University in the Netherlands; this is the opportunity to thank him for his dedication to the oystercatcher monitoring this season, and to wish him success with the next phase of his studies.
Fieldwork 7 : 21 and 22 December
This is a report on the 7th fieldwork trip of the 2025/26 oystercatcher breeding season. We found six new nests with eggs (five in the southern half, nests S19 to S23; and one in the northern half, N40). This brings the total number of nests found to 63.
When you see the eggs, they are obvious. Nest S21.
Both of the chicks that were ringed during Fieldwork 5, on 8 and 9 December, are doing fine. The parents no longer bother to hide them, because they can fly. This chick is 42 days old; they fly at about 40 days old. It still has lots of growing to do.
The rusty ship’s boiler on the shore marks the end of the afternoon’s fieldwork on Sunday at 19h00. The team will be back here at 06h30 to continue.
The new nests are in red. The position of nest N40 still needs to be added. It lies between N14 and N30, just south of the harbour.
Bird list
This is the bird species list for Fieldwork 7. Two species, in bold, were recorded for the first time this summer. The list has 38 species.
Species
Note
Cisticola, Zitting
Along the road between the foghorn and the airfield
Cormorant, Bank
Cormorant, Cape
Cormorant, Crowned
Cormorant, White-breasted
Only seen at the harbour; maybe three present.
Crane, Blue
Over airfield, harassed by Kelp Giull
Crow, Pied
Dove, Red-eyed
Dove, Ring-necked
Egret, Cattle
Egret, Little
Fiscal, Southern
Goose, Egyptian
Guineafowl, Helmeted
Gull, Hartlaub’s
Gull, Kelp
Ibis, African Sacred
Ibis, Hadada
Kestrel, Rock
One seen, hunting from tree
Night Heron, Black-crowned
One, just after dawn apparently flying from the coast to its daytime roost
Oystercatcher, African
We have our first fledglings!
Partridge, Chukar
Penguin, African
Pigeon, Speckled
Plover, White-fronted
Sparrow, House
Seen in three places! Harbour, research house, in the village
Spurfowl, Cape
Starling, Common
Swallow, Barn
Swallow, White-throated
Swift, Little
Tern, Common
Tern, Greater Crested
Tern, Sandwich
Thick-knee, Spotted
Turnstone, Ruddy
One, south of Bluestone Quarry
Weaver, Cape
Whimbrel, Eurasian
Total
38 species
We made the second ever record for the Robben Island of Blue Crane. It was circling above the northwestern corner of the island, over the remains of the airfield, which dates back to the Second World War. This northwestern part of the island is part of the scattered Kelp Gull breeding colony, so it is not a surprise that the intruder was mobbed by a Kelp Gull. See the photos below.
The most recently added species was African Dusky Flycatcher, on 23 May 2024. See the paper First record of African Dusky Flycatcher on Robben Island published in Biodiversity Observations.The total bird list for Robben Island remains on 166, but the list of species recorded since 2000 increases to 136. The most useful paper on Robben Island’s birds is available here. It was published way in back in 2011, so it needs an update!
Fieldwork 6 : 15 and 16 December
This is a report on the 6th fieldwork trip of the 2025/26 oystercatcher breeding season. We found 14 new nests with eggs (four in the southern half, nests S15 to S18; 10 in the northern half, N30 to N39). This brings the total number of nests found to 57. See the map below. We found our first three-egg clutch of the season. Here it is … nest N37:
37 of the 57 nests found with eggs still have eggs. Probably 10 pairs of the 57 nests have chicks which are alive, judged by the fact that the adults are alarming when we pass through their territories. So the are about 10 pairs which either lost eggs or small chicks. It is still early enough in the breeding season for these pairs to produce a replacement clutch. These are produced on average about 14 days after the loss of eggs or chicks.
Territories are short sections of the shore, and so nests are close together, so we can’t always be certain which chicks originally belong to which nests. But this chick probably comes from N01; from the records, it probably hatched on about 20 November, so on 15 December it would have been about 25 days old. It was being dive-bombed by Kelp Gulls.
The African Oystercatchers seem to have had a particularly good breeding year so far. Relatively few nests have been lost. Eggs which were laid before the middle of November have hatched by now (incubation period of about 28 days) so there are chicks at all stages of development, from hatchlings onwards. Chicks fly at around 40 days, at about two-thirds of adult weight.
This is the distribution of nests around Robben Island. The newly found nests are in red. Nests fund during Fieldworks 1 to 5 are in blue.
As on previous rounds of fieldwork, we found lots of scrapes. The scrape is placed alongside strands of dry kelp. When the oystercatcher is incubating, it will not be conspicuous! Hopefully many of these scrapes will become red dots on the map, with eggs found in them soon …
This scrape is on the southern half of the island. There are lots of territories here. Currently, there are only 18 nests in the south, compared with 39 in the north!
Birds
This is our bird list, in alphabetical order. The six species in bold were seen during Fieldwork 6 for the first time this summer.
Species
Comment
African Oystercatcher
We are on 57 nests so far.
African Penguin
Several with penguin cellulitis were observed (see photos below) and reported. They have since been collected and admitted to SANCCOB for treatment.
African Sacred Ibis
Bank Cormorant
Blacksmith Lapwing
Cape Cormorant
Cape Spurfowl
Caspian Tern
One feeding along shore north of harbour
Chukar Partridge
Common, with chicks
Common Starling
Crowned Lapwing
The chicks of the pair on the football field are large
Egyptian Goose
Isolated birds along the shore, and three in Van Riebeek’s Quarry
Eurasian Whimbrel
Fiery-necked Nightjar
One heard along Boundary Road in evening
Fiscal Flycatcher
One seem along Boundary Road
Greater Crested Tern
Gathering. Pairs starting to do display flights
Hadada Ibis
Hartlaub’s Gull
About 30 at harbour
Helmeted Guineafowl
House Sparrow
One seen at harbour, one at research house
Kelp Gull
Breeding around north end of island, from the harbour to just north of Boundary Road. Lots of chicks of assorted sizes. Fledged young.
Little Egret
Little Swift
Pied Crow
At least five on the island
Red-eyed Dove
Ring-necked Dove
Rock Kestrel
One on tall tree
Ruddy Turnstone
Sandwich Tern
One at harbour
Southern Fiscal
Speckled Pigeon
Spotted Thick-knee
Western Cattle Egret
Small numbers
White-throated Swallow
White-breasted Cormorant
White-fronted Plover
Yellow-billed Kite
One seen circling over central grassland
… the right eye and the left eye of the same Speckled Pigeon. Non-circular pupils!
African Penguins have more than enough problems to deal with. Here is a new one. The bird in the centre of the photograph below has a newly occurring condition which has been dubbed cellulitis. Look at the fat legs. The beautiful sleek feathers indicate that it has spent a couple of weeks on the shore doing moult. It is now desperately needing to get back to the ocean to regain condition, but it has accumulated fluid in the legs. The cause of the condition is unknown. We spotted several penguins like this, provided exact coordinates, and they have been admitted to SANCCOB, where the skills exist to treat this condition:
The middle two penguins below are serious cases of penguin cellulitis. The penguin at the back is still moulting.
The feather replacement phase of moult takes about 14 days. They come ashore looking like garden gnomes. Even the flippers are full of fat. They are on land for about three weeks living off the fat reserves, sustaining not only themselves, but doing the energetically process of growing a complete new coat of feathers simulataneously. The annual moult is a mega-challenge for penguins. They can’t skip moult, because the old feathers lose their ability to enable the penguin to swim in a bubble of air, and keep the cold out.
This was our first Caspian Tern of the summer. It was feeding over the shoreline north of the harbour.
Egyptian Geese in Van Riebeek’s Quarry, south end of the island.
Fieldwork 5 : 8 and 9 December 2025
This view is always a reminder of the privilege it is to do research on the Robben Island World Heritage Site. We are grateful to the Robben Island Museum for the opportunity to do fieldwork here, and for the logistics provided.
On this fifth fieldwork trip of the 2025/26 African Oystercatcher breeding season, we found 13 new nests (S14 in the southern half of the island, and N19 to N29 in the northern half). The northern half is racing ahead with twice as many nests as the southern half. The total number of nests found at the egg stage is now 43. None of the clutches so far have had three eggs.
We found one dead ringed oystercatcher: ring K50080. The SAFRING database says that it was ringed on 5 February 2018 as an adult male.
We ringed the two chicks which hatched on 11 November 2025 on Trip 1. See far below! They have grown from …
… this fluffball size, covered in down, to …
… this almost completely feathered chick is 29 days old. All oystercatcher chicks weigh close to 39 g when they hatch. When we ringed this one, it weighed 421 g and the other chick was 355 g. When there are two chicks, the weights often diverge as they get older. They are capable of flight at around 470 g, which is about two-thirds of adult mass. They are still growing when they start flying!
Chicks are starting to hatch in quite a few of the first-laid nests. For example, here is N17 …
Our egg measurements and the masses when we found nest N17, and our formulae, suggested that incubation for these two eggs in N17 started on 8 November. The average incubation period is 30 days; this takes us to a stab at hatch date of 8 December. These two fluffballs were observed, still in the nest, on 9 December, so our method works well (at least in this case!). The ice cream tub is ours, but the immediate surroundings of this nest contain an alarming amount of little pieces of plastic and other rubbish. The litter does not come from the island; much of it gets dumped into Table Bay by the Black River which is the stormwater drain for much of the City of Cape Town. If you didn’t read this blog as part of Fieldwork 2, read it now: Industrial biodiversity 2 : Black River in Paarden Island : stormwater drain.
If you failed to spot the N17 fluffballs in the photo above, here is a second opportunity, and a chance for a close up view of a piece of litter.
This egg is “starred”. The hatchling will emerge, but the process of getting out of the shell is measured in days, not hours!
This is the state of play after Fieldwork 5. The nests found this visit are shown in red. They are strikingly clustered. The positions of nests found during the earlier fieldwork sessions are in blue. Diane Smith produced this map.
Bird list
Bird list in alphabetical order. It is our second longest list so far this summer, at 36 species. The longest had 41 species, during Fieldwork 1.
Species
Comment
African Oystercatcher
Breeding deeply underway (see above!)
African Penguin
Small numbers moulting
African Sacred Ibis
Flying to and from mainland
Bank Cormorant
Breeding at short arm
Barn Swallow
One seen hawking over shore
Blacksmith Lapwing
A pair in the Blue Stone Quarry
Black-crowned Night Heron
One on the shore close to the Sea Challenger, late afternoon
Black-winged Stilt
2 at Bluestone Quarry; third record for the island (see below)
Cape Batis
One in “woodland” alongside Boundary Road
Cape Cormorant
Cape Spurfowl
Groups include young birds
Cape Weaver
Chukar Partridge
Groups include young birds
Common Starling
Common Tern
One at harbour
Crowned Cormorant
Crowned Lapwing
Pair with young on football field
Egyptian Goose
A few at the Blue Stone Quarry
Eurasian Whimbrel
Several
Great Cormorant
One at harbour
Greater Crested Tern
Hundreds gathering
Hadada Ibis
A few
Hartlaub’s Gull
Mostly at the harbour
Helmeted Guineafowl
Groups include young birds
Kelp Gull
Breeding; both eggs and young
Little Egret
A handful, scattered along coast at rockpools
Pied Crow
Scattered. Possibly five
Red-eyed Dove
Ring-necked Dove
Ruddy Turnstone
Small group
Southern Fiscal
Scattered across island; juveniles present
Speckled Pigeon
Lots
Spotted Thick-knee
Heard at night near research house
Western Cattle Egret
Arrive from mainland in evening
White-fronted Plover
Second nest found
White-throated Swallow
A pair at the harbour
There were at least two Black-winged Stilt at the Bluestone Quarry. This is the third record for the species on Robben Island. The first was made September and December 2012 (see First observation of Black-winged Stilt Himantopus himantopus on Robben Island), and the second was made between November and December 2017, on checklists for the Second Southern African Bird Atlas Project. Unfortunately, there are no photographs, but hopefully the stilts will stay for a while, as on the previous two occasions, and we will get a photographic record during Fieldwork 6!
The tips of the outermost primaries of this Common Tern are starting to disintegrate. They will likely have something like 30,000 km on the clock since they were replaced in around February-March this year. A northwards and a southwards migration, and lots of flying while on the breeding grounds. Bird ringing shows that most of the Common Terns that migrate to South Africa breed in the countries around the Baltic Sea: especially Finland and Sweden.
White-fronted Plover.
Mole snake
Mole Snake, c. 40 cm, young specimen still showing some white spots. This was the only Mole Snake seen during Fieldwork 5.
Fallow deer
Here is a young fallow deer boldly walking along the main road between the village and the harbour on Robben Island, at 09h00 on a week day morning!
Stop the Fallow Deer. There is a tiny number of adults left. But if left, it’ll grow rapidly again to another large herd. They are destructive to the vegetation, which is recovering amazingly after the ravages of centuries of rabbits.
Plastic
Besides the plastic in and around the nest above, here is a plastic bottle …
Dianne found this water bottle on Robben Island. Internet archaeology revealed that Nongfu Spring is the top supplier of bottled water in China. You are invited to visualize the journey this plastic took from source to shore.
Nightlife
The City of Cape Town, from Robben Island, 8 December 2012. Table Mountain is floodlit.
Fieldwork 4 : 3 and 4 December 2025
We found six new nests (S13 on southern half, and N14 to N18 in the north) . Total nests found with eggs so is now 30. Although there are territories and pairs waiting to breed all around the island, those that have made a start are in clusters!
Diane Smith produced this map.
A couple of nests have had one or both eggs predated. The most intriguing incident of all left behind evidence that looked like this …
The nest had a single egg on several previous visits. The broken egg is still inside the nest cup. The obvious suspects are Mole Snakes, Kelp Gulls and Feral Cats. But Mole Snakes consume eggs whole; Kelp Gulls carry them away in their beaks; the mammalogists say this is not cat damage, and they suspect a stab by a beak. It turns out that there was another oystercatcher nest 5 m away. Bruno Ens, in The Netherlands, says that he has seen Eurasian Oystercatchers stab the eggs of their neighbours, so vandalism, rather than food, is probably the most likely explanation. The contents of the egg have dried out, rather than have been consumed.
The eggs in several nests have hatched since our last visit …
Newly hatched chick, still drying off. The eggshell, in two parts, has not yet been removed. Curated in observation.org
One of the views from the 360 degree office. Spring low tide. The black/dark brown stuff on the shore and in the sea is the kelp Ecklonia maxima, sea bamboo.
Bird list
This is a list of species recorded during this fieldwork trip. They are listed in the order recorded, with a list that started at the research house. Species in red are linked to the structured texts on the BDI website. Species with an asterisk have photos; they are below the table, and in the same order as listed.
* c. 300 about 2/3rds of way back to The Waterfront
Kelp Gull incubating.
Two feathered Kelp Gull chicks. The chick on the right still has a downy head.
Juvenile Eurasian Whimbrel. The pattern of feathers on the back gives this away. This bird is likely to be about six months old. Likely to have hatched in the taiga in Russia, the huge belt of coniferous forests between the tundra and the steppes.
Pied Crows.
Chukar Partridge, one of the parents of the chicks below.
These fluffballs could not be more than a day or two old. But they were FAST. This record is in observation.org as record 3817981025
Ring-necked Dove. Confirmed by the white tail in flight.
Crowned Lapwing chicks, on the football pitch at the maximum security prison, photographed through the two prison fences!
Sandwich Tern. It already had five or six new primaries on its right wing, and the 10th primary has broken tips and is bedraggled through a year’s wear. But the bill tip has very little yellow, and there are darker grey feathers on he wing coverts, so maybe it is a second year bird, i.e. hatched about May-June 2024. Ring recoveries show that most of the Sandwich Terns that migrate to southern Africa breed along the coasts of the North Sea.
Sabine’s Gulls seem to have become increasingly infrequent in Table Bay in the past two decades. We passed a substantial-sized flock. Geolocator studies show that the Sabine’s Gulls that migrate here breed in eastern Canada. There is a different set of photos in observation.org
Reptiles
There are lots of Angulate Tortoises on Robben Island. Mostly they are invisible. Then there is a cool breeze, or mist blows in from the ocean, or there is dew on the ground in the early morning, or there has been rain, and vast numbers are on the move. They risk their lives crossing roads. This one moved at speed.
This was the only Mole Snake on this trip. It is in observation.org
Fieldwork 3 : 27 and 28 November 2025
We found 14 new nests (S07 to S12, and N06 to N13), so the total number of nests found with eggs for the breeding season so far is 25. Nest S05, which had one egg on the previous trip, now has two! All nests found with eggs on previous trips still have the same number of eggs (or more!), so there have been no losses due to predation, or any other cause. In addition there is one pair which has two chicks, and a second pair suspected to have at least one chick.
Our study species, the African Oystercatcher. The bird on the left has been ringed.
Diane is measuring and weighing the eggs at nest S08. The process takes a few minutes, and is only done once. We have never had a desertion.
Nest S09, with two eggs, is in the centre of this photograph. There is also an arrow on the flat rock which points to the eggs.
Team 3 at work in the office.
Photogenic species!
The final stage of production of an oystercatcher egg is done in the paintshop. Every egg has a unique pattern.
This is the distribution of nests around Robben Island, 28 November 2025! The gap is the harbour. There appears to be strong clustering of nests.
Bird species27–28 November
This is our list of bird species, in the order in which they were recorded for the bird atlas project (SABAP2, pentad 3345_1820, Robben Island). The first bird seen after we started atlasing was a Chukar Partridge. There are some surprising omissions. We didn’t see a Cape Wagtail, although, between the four of us, we covered the entire coastline. We failed to see sparrows, neither Cape nor House. Pied Crow is missing. We looked for White-throated Swallow as we waited about 20 minutes at Murrays Bay Harbour for the ferry, but didn’t see them. The Bank Cormorant is the final species on the list; there were nests of breeding birds on the short arm breakwater as we left the harbour.
African Penguin was low down on the list at 17, i.e. the 17th species to be recorded. That is scary low. Most of these are juveniles doing their first moult. They moult into adult plumage, even though it is likely to be several years before they start to breed.
Cape Cormorant with chick. The number of Cape Cormorants breeding this spring seems much smaller than in previous years.
White-fronted Plover.
Other species
This big male Cape Fur Seal was one of three seen on the shore a couple of hundred metres south of the Faure Jetty. It has a nasty open wound on its right flipper.
We found this piece of shed mole snake skin at these coordinates along West Perimeter Road. The snake had clearly used a big piece of chipboard as den.
Cricket.
Sea urchin.
Abalone shell.
A lighter note, but actually dark!
73 lighters found on 2 km of shoreline by three observers! Robben Island sits alongside busy shipping lanes into the port of Cape Town, and also in the dispersal fan of the trash that washes out to sea from 214 square kilometres of the city of Cape Town via the Black River. See Industrial biodiversity 2 : Black River in Paarden Island : stormwater drain.
Fieldwork 2 : 18 and 19 November 2025
This was the second trip of the breeding season. Rene Navarro did the monitoring single-handed. He found nine new nests (S03 to S06 and N01 to N05). The two eggs in N01 are both pipped, so they were laid about a month ago! S01 and S02 (see Fieldwork 1, below) are still going strong.
S03. First nest of the Fieldwork 2 trip. Minimalist approach to nest architecture.
Both eggs in nest N01 were starred. The chicks will gradually turn the fine cracks into a bigger and bigger hole in the eggs, and will hatch within a couple of days.
Fieldwork 1 : 10 and 11 November 2025
We started the African Oystercatcher monitoring on Robben Island on 10 and 11 November 2025. The focus of this phase of the monitoring is on the 2025/26 breeding season.
Theoretically, it is exceptionally early in the breeding season. The African Oystercatchers should be right at the start of their breeding season. To our astonishment we found that one pair were the proud and noisy parents to two recently-hatched fluffballs:
The chick at the bottom of the photo is not yet completely dry, so had hatched in the previous couple of hours. The nest, i.e. the place where the eggs were incubated. is the shallow depression immediately to the left of this fluffball.We knew there were chicks because the parents were going absolutely ballistic. They are totally blasé when there are eggs. But the moment they hatch, there is a radical change in behaviour.
One of parents pretended to be injured. It did an Oscar-winning performance, a distraction display in which the “injured” bird tries to lead you away from its chicks. As in the video below!
The video failed to capture the more determined parts of the display.
One of the parents was ringed:
The ring has six characters. The left photo shows: K50 _ _ _ ; the right photo gives _ _ _ 313. Therefore K50313. It had been ringed, as a breeding adult, on 4 January 2019. Potentially, we can read a more ring numbers by taking lots of photographs. Say, 30. Then you can hope to get an in-focus photo of each digit!
We saw lots and lots of scrapes, some of which will have eggs added over the next weeks and months. We found two nests with eggs: S01 and S02. Both had two eggs. Here are photos of the nests.
S01 is a scrape that has been neatly line with shell fragments.
S01, the “Traffic Beacon Nest”. The big marker is a few metres away from the nest. Close to the nest there are arrows on the rocks to point to the nest. If the nest gets destroyed, by a predator, or worse, a storm (which moves stuff around), we can then work out where the eggs actually were. We need to do this, because the African Oystercatcher takes a minimalist approach to nest architecture.
S01 is a nicely concealed nest, above the spring high tide level.
S02 is a little depression, lined with fragments of shells and little stones, just on the seaside of a small ridge of kelp. The incubating oystercatcher can see over it, but its body is concealed.
The “Box Nest” has a series of markers, starting at the road around the perimeter of the island.They get more subtle closer to the nest.
The final marker is the little piece of white plastic (there is lots of debris washing up on the shore) halfway between the box and the nest, just at the thin line of kelp.
Mammals: Cape Golden Mole (fresh runs), Humpback Whale (three together, including a small calf, just outside Murrays Bay Harbour on 11 November), Steenbok.
Butterfly: Cabbage White
A Sunfish was seen during the trip back to the Waterfront.
Papers
We have done a fair amount of science over the years resulting from this monitoring. Here are some of the Open Access papers.
Braby J, Underhill LG 2007. Was poor breeding productivity of African Black Oystercatchers on Robben Island in 2004/05 caused by Feral Cats, Kelp Gulls, Mole Snakes or the Sumatra tsunami? Wader Study Group Bulletin 113: 66–70.
Calf KM, Underhill LG 2002. Productivity of African Black Oystercatchers Haematopus moquini on Robben Island in the 2001/02 breeding season. Wader Study Group Bulletin 99: 45–49.
Quintana I, Button R, Underhill LG 2021. African Oystercatchers on Robben Island, South Africa: The 2019/2020 breeding season in its two decadal context. Wader Study 128: 209–219.
There are papers to be added. It will take a while to find the online versions.
Acknowledgements
We are grateful to the Robben Island Museum for a vast amount of logistical support for the African Oystercatcher monitoring project. This has been provided over a period of 25 years; we started in the summer of 2001/02. This fieldwork is done with ethical clearance and a research permit.
“How do we get people interested in the environment?” “How do people get connected to nature?” This gallery of photos, taken at the Nuwejaars Wetlands this past week, has one of the answers!
Beware. There is a mist net ahead. One of the poles is an arm’s length to the right of Rocco’s right arm! It took them by surprise.
Dembo, from The Gambia, is explaining Malachite Sunbird to Grade 7s. This was the oldest class at Elim Primary School. We had Grade 1 to Grade 7, plus the special needs school, split into 27 groups of about 10 in a group.
This male Malachite Sunbird has impressive pectoral tufts.
Diane explaining Cape Sparrow to a focused group of learners.
In training as a releaser of Fiscal Flycatcher. Note the correct ringer’s way to hold a bird.
There can be few activities that achieve “connectedness to nature” as well as bird ringing does.
We are grateful to the Nuwejaars Wetlands SMA (Special Management Area) for the opportunity to help with their environmental education programme.
This modest building is the nerve centre of all the activities of the Nuwejaars Wetlands SMA.
This was our first Cape Sugarbird at Hazevlakte. Our normal stake out for sugarbirds is about 8 km away. In contrast, Malachite Kingfishers are common in the floodplain.
Mist nets in the floodplain.
African Rail, a bird species that is not often seen! We handle them quite regularly here!
This was a week when mist netting was not easy. Spike Milligan has a poem called Granny. The poem has three verses, and the second verse goes like this.
All through the night the wind grew worse
It nearly made the vicar curse
The top had fallen of the steeple
Just missing him (and other people)
Our version of it runs like this:
All through the night the wind grew worse
It nearly made the ringers curse
The nets were moving as fast as arrows
Just scaring birds, like all the sparrows
So we spent some time looking at other things …
Raucous Toads Sclerophrys capensis making a new generation of Raucous Toads.
If you get the right angle on the hairy caterpillar of the Cape Lappet Moth Eutricha capensis it is delightfully attractive!
We found two damselflies. Common Threadtail Elattoneura glaca (top) and Common Citril Ceriagrion glabrum (bottom).
And we spent some time eating.
That looks like a good snack for lunch!
The pizza oven did good service again …
Roasted for an hour.
We had lots of time to talk, the Hazevlakte units have lots of comfortable space to do this. We planned a couple of papers for Biodiversity Observtions.
You cannot see the wind in a photograph!
For the first two mornings the wind was calm. The sheep did lawnmower duty, and the eucalypts reflected in the Nuwejaars River.
As we left the Agulhas Plain, we saw this fire starting in the outskirts of Bredasdorp.
All through the day the wind grew worse
It really made the fireteams curse
The flames were eating up the trees
and racing through the veld with ease
The fire was still burning along the top of the range of mountains west of Bredasdorp two days later! The choppers try to prevent loss of property.
Thanks, Ross, for the video.
There is a list of all the upcoming BDI events here. Links to reports of previous events are here. There is a blog about the value of bird ringing to research and conservation here. This blog is about the value of bird ringing as a way to develop connectedness to nature.
There is no pollution from city light. We are deep in the countryside. There is no moon. The night is dark. Above our heads, the Southern Cross and The Pointers remind us that we are in the southern hemisphere. To be precise, we are at Ouberg Private Nature Reserve, deep in the mountains behind Montagu …
Too soon, the night gives way to dawn, the ringers are up early, …
… checking the mist nets which were opened at first light …
… and which are essentially invisible against the background of vegetation.
This Acacia Pied Barbet is being held with its head between the first and second fingers, and then the back fits snugly into the palm of the hand. That beak is powerful and sharp! If you don’t hold a barbet correctly in the ringers’ grip, the head swivels round on the flexible neck, and the ringer’s blood starts to flow.
With an average mass of 6 g, the Fairy Flycatcher is the lightest (and smallest) bird species in southern Africa.
It is ringers who are privileged to see the delicate shade of peach on the underparts.
Pearl-breasted Swallow.
This is a list of species handled, and the numbers of each species. Those in red have links to structured species descriptions on the BDI website:
To what extent do birds in a habitat like this make use of the drainage lines as highways? That is a question that interests us!
This is the communal area at the campsite (glamping and bring-your-own-tent) at the Ouberg Private Nature Reserve. It is ideal for our needs.
One corner of the communal area at Ouberg Private Nature Reserve turned into ringing office!
These ringing blogs often lapse into a focus on food. This one is no exception. Two interns from the Basque Country in Spain, Ana and Iñaki, treated us to tortilla de patatas, aka, Spanish omelette.
You can get links to all our reports on events like this on this website. There is a list of future events here.
There is a description of the value of bird ringing to research and conservation here.
The Ouberg Private Nature Reserve is 20 km northeast of the town of Montagu in the Western Cape. It is in the foothills of big mountains. Three biomes meet here. The vegetation is a mosaic of Fynbos, Albany Thicket and Succulent Karoo.
Part 1 : The birds and the ringing
This is one of the Biodiversity and Development Institute’s core ringing sites. We have been ringing here several times a year since 2020. We are steadily building up a population of ringed birds, and we plan to analyse the data we collect. For example, there are no estimates of survival rates for most of the species that we ring. That needs a long-term ringing commitment to a site. There is a blog on the value of bird ringing here.
We used mainly mist nets, and we also had spring traps.
We handled a lot of interesting birds!
This Bar-throated Apalis hatched this past spring breeding season, so it is probably three or four months old. It is a young bird because it does not yet have a well-developed throat-band, and a dark-grey iris, rather than the white of the adult. The eye colour is not mentioned in the field guides!
This Acacia Pied Barbet is being held in the ringers’ grip, with the neck between the first finger and the second finger. In this position the bird fits gently against the front of the hand but under complete control. There is no chance of being bitten by that formidable beak, which can draw blood if the bird is not held properly. These are skills you learn as a ringer.
The Sombre Greenbul is not an easy bird to see, because it skulks in the canopy. So when it is in the hand, we get the opportunity to see the creamy white eye. The eyes of a bird appear to be on opposite sides of the head, which gives them a vast field of view. Imagine a circle of vision for each eye. From the photo above, we can tell that these two circles overlap a bit. When the bird looks at an object in this overlap zone, it can see properly in three dimensions, like we do. That makes it possible to guage the distance to fly to a branch, or to the next item of food.
It is only ringers who really get to see the royal purple patch on the rump of a White-backed Mousebird.
Cape White-eye. The white ring around the eye consists of feathers. Whereas for the …
… Cape Bulbul, the white around the eye is bare skin. This bare skin forms an ellipse, and the eye of the Cape Bulbul is a bit to the rear of the centre of the ellipse. In contrast, the African Red-eyed Bulbul has an eye-ring which is circular (and, obviously, red) and the eye is in the centre of the circle.
This Bokmakierie was a retrap! 4B16627 was ringed on 23 April 2025, during our last visit here.
And so was the next Bokmakierie! 4A93536 had been ringed here more than four years ago, on 24 July 2021. It has not been retrapped on any of the about 10 ringing visits we have made to Ouberg since July 2021.
Have you ever wondered how the white V on the back of a Southern Fiscal is constructed?
The table below shows that we handled a total of 138 birds, of which an impressive 28 were retraps. The retraps are especially valuable for the statistical analyses which estimate survival rates. But we need to keep this effort up for a bunch more years! Species in red have links to structured species accounts on the BDI website.
There is a list of future planned ringing events here. And a list of all past events which do have blog reports is here.
Part 2 : The food
Let the pictures tell the story!
Part 3 : The place
In 2022, Sue Gie made a presentation about the Ouberg Private Nature Reserve at the annual conference of the Southern African Wildlife Management Association (SAWMA). You can listen to it here (15 minutes). It provides a fascinating backdrop to help you understand the history and conservation value of Ouberg.
The photos below show the campsite, one of the four glamping tents, and the open-plan kitchen-dining-living space.
Ouberg Private Nature Reserve has a website. It represents an awesome place at which to escape from the city. The email address is info@ouberg.co.za.
The BDI is holding an Open Day for bird ringing at Grotto Bay on Saturday, 29 November 2025 15 November 2025. We will be hosted by the local community at Grotto Bay Private Nature Reserve. The reserve has an area of 385 ha, and the vegetation consists of Strandveld and Sandveld. It is about 60 km north of Cape Town, turning off the R27. We meet at the Conservation Centre within the reserve.
Two of our previous bird ringing visits to Grotto Bay have blogs describing the events: they were on 27 May 2023 and 31 August 2024. The privilege of being a ringer is the opportunity to see birds like this Long-billed Crombec up close, and to see the detailed structure of the feathers. There is a description of the value of bird ringing here.
Long-billed Crombec, ringed at the Open Day for bird ringing at Grotto Bay Private Nature Reserveon 31 August 2024.The Long-billed Crombec has a remarkably short tail. It is only when you see this bird in the hand that you can actually see the size of the tail feathers. Photo : Suzette Vorster
There is lots of space, so ringers are welcome to bring their own nets and ringing equipment. Afterwards we will make a total list of all birds ringed, and produce a blog for the event.
The reserve is not open to the public, so you will not just be able to arrive on the morning of the event! You will gently be turned away with 100% certainty! If you plan to attend, please send an email to me at les@thebdi.org before Tuesday 25 November 11 November. In the email, please include the registration of the vehicle you will travel in, plus ID number and cell phone number. That information is used to pre-arrange entrance at the gate. Information and a code of conduct for visitors to the Grotto Bay Private Nature Reserve is here.
Sunrise on 29 November 15 November is at 05h28 05h35. So the best time to arrive if you are planning to put up mist nets is around 05h00. Otherwise come anytime early in the morning; 07h30 to 08h00 is probably about optimal! We will probably have left by 12h00.
One of the most important components of being trainied as a bird ringer is to learn the skill of being able to extract birds from mistnets safely. This Cape Robin-chat was ringed on 31 August 2024. We might well retrap this bird on 15 December 2025. Photo : Suzette Vorster
There is a list of all the upcoming BDI events here. After Grotto Bay, the next Open Day for bird ringing will be on 20 December 2025, at Zandvlei. This will be ringing followed by brunch.
Links to reports of previous events are here, and there is a blog about the value of bird ringing to research and conservation here.
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 sites. We had several failures and a few successes!
One of the biggest successes was the discovery of the accommodation on the farm Hazevlakte. This is the view of the Nuwejaars River looking upstream …
… and below is the view looking downstream …
The eucalypts on the opposite bank are alien. Their redeeming feature is that they are used by African Fish-eagles, cormorants, etc.
The werf at Hazevlakte provides a variety of habitats for mist netting. We found that the species diversity extends beyond weavers, bishops, starlings and sparrows to include Blacksmith Lapwing. Southern Fiscal, Fiscal Flycatcher, Olive Thrush, Malachite Sundird and Cape Robin-chat.
Here’s a … thanks, Ryan
mist net being set up in a patch of grass on the tree-lined edge of the werf at Hazevlakte on a misty morning. There are little grove of trees to the left of the photograph. Weavers, starlings and sparrows were nesting in these trees, and flying out to the irrigated fields in the background to feed.
More mist nets being set up in the werf. Weaver nests in the background.
Male Malachite Sunbird, displaying one of his bright yellow pectoral patches.
Southern Fiscal, a male because of the absence of a brown patch on his flanks/
This Lesser Honeyguide was not in primary moult. Not surprising, because moult starts after the spring breeding season. Lesser Honeyguide is one of a tiny number of South African species with modelled estimates of the timing of moult, based on data collected during bird ringing. The mean starting date is estimated to be 8 January, and the duration is 140 days, so that 28 May is the mean completion date. There is a lot of individual variation. 140 days to replace primaries! That is four-and-a-half months. That is a pretty slow growth rate.
So the werf at Nuwejaars was declared a Potentially Important Ringing Site.
The werf at Hazevlakte has this negative bird that makes you wonder if your eyesight is going wonky. Unfortunately, we didn’t catch it, or any other Hadeda! [**Update : this leucistic Hadeda Ibis has been seen on almost all of our subsequent visit to Hazevlakte, and most recently on 22 September 2025**]
We did an exploratory trip one afternoon to a protea patch on the farm Zandvlakte. We caught four Cape Sugarbirds. These are quite likely the southernmost sugarbirds ever to be ringed! This locality was added to the list of discovered sites to be revisited on future trips, a second Potentially Important Ringing Site.
We tried several other sites, but none of them reached the threshold to become Potentially Important Ringing Sites.
There were days when we caught the sunrise, and little else!
The table gives the total number of birds of each species handled.
One of the six Malachite Sunbirds we ringed was a nestling at one of the less profitable sites! The date was 11 October 2024. This bird was found in a garden of a house near the southern tip of Africa, in L’Agulhas, 22 km from where it had been ringed. It was caught by a domestic cat, but not killed outright, but did not survive. Even though the story is tragic, it is an interesting example of juvenile dispersal.
Damselfly discovery
We did a ringing expedition to a site which turned out to be the poorest a site could possibly be. We had zero birds to ring. But we did have a damselfly to photograph. To everyone’s astonishment, the damselfly was identified as Spesbona. This species is classified as Endangered; it is extremely rare and localized. Before looking at the damselfly, look at the distribution map for the species …
The new record is the southernmost, and a long way from the others, which are along the mountain chain between Knysna and Somerset West.
This is the Spesbona seen at Hazevlakte on the Nuwejaars Wetlands. In relation to most other species of dragonfly and damselfly, this is a species that is in flight relatively early, with a mid-October peak. You can read up about Spesbona in the Online Atlas of Dragonflies and Damselflies of South Africa, with the species text here.
Thanks
Erica Brink, Nuwejaars Wetlands Special Management Area, organized our accommodation with Karen Neethling at Hazevlakte. It turned out to be an inspired arrangement. Eugene Hahndiek helped us find ringing sites, and arranged access to them.
