Super Sefapane and Tremendous Taita Falcons

Dear All,

After our long trip back towards KZN, we stopped at Sefapane Lodge a Bird Friendly Establishment at Phalaborwa to see Idah, the local bird guide based there and see how she was doing. To our delight Sefapane’s bird list was really good and we managed to pick up on a few extra-birds that we dipped on in Kruger due to the dry-weather. The three dams and the lodge gardens were filled with birds and we managed to get African Mourning Dove, Brown-headed Parrot, Greater-blue Eared Starling, Groundscraper Thrush, Lesser Masked Weaver our first Dierderick Cuckoo of the season. Black Crake and White-faced Duck was also added to the tally. Idah is progressing well and will be taking the early morning bird walks around the lodge and thanks to Brenden Pienaar the Kruger to Canyons Project Manager also getting to know the birds and sites in and around the BaPhalaborwa area.

Evening calls by Scops Owl and the general bird viewing at the dams made for a welcome respite with an early morning cup of coffee to jump-start tired batteries. We proceeded on to JG Strydom tunnel for our longest leg of the trip, which would lead us down to Wakkerstroom via Blyderiver Canyon, Graskop, Sabie, White-river, Nelspruit, Barberton and Piet Retief. It makes for some rewarding back route driving through some spectacular countryside. We stopped at the Abel Erasmus Pass looking for Michael Kumako the local guide with no luck, but managed to track him down at home via cell-phone. Not wanting to disturb him we were going to push on and forego his services and catch up with him on our next training visit in a few weeks. Michael’s unflinching spirit and good nature won as over and we drove up to his home village and picked him up and returned to the site. He sacrificed one of his mornings off for us from his four children, he has two sets of twins unbelievingly, and judging from their fathers influence are fast on track to becoming hard-core Taita custodians themselves. Further conversations with other members of the community demonstrated how almost all adults and a good amount of teenagers knew about the Taita and its importance. That can only be ascribed to Michaels great work and ongoing commitment to the birds, the environment, the area and its people.

Amazingly, without his Bushnell Spotting Scope which is in Johannesburg for repairs, or binoculars he detected the male bird in under thirty seconds at arriving at the viewing site. The male bird was at perch scanning for its staple diet of Rock Martins high above us, but through binoculars and our scope we had lovely clean views of the bird. The birds are nesting and the female is currently out-of-sight unseen waiting for her regular meals to be dropped off by her attentive partner. Interestingly Michael had worked out the average numbers for successful strikes whilst they have been nesting. He witnessed 4 to 7 success strikes per day by the male bird. That is pretty impressive by any margin. Rock Martins feature the highest on the Taita’s diet according to Michael. Michael also showed us the nesting site which for obvious reasons we will not describe and if anyone was actually silly enough to attempt having a crack at it would no doubts be pulled off the mountain by angry stall vendors and local people and would probably conveniently disappear from life. For those passing through wanting to see the Taita’s try and ring Michael (079 261 1559) if you do not find him and check the second stand of stalls after the JG Strydom tunnel. Michael has a stand dead centre amongst the others, with a sign board donated by BirdLife Inkwazi and Bushnell Optics hanging from the roof. Michael also demonstrated his broad knowledge of all the birds in the Abel Erasmus Pass and we completed our pre-assessment planning with him. A short stop at the Blyde River Canyon was a lovely closure to those awe-inspiring mountains. Cape Vulture graced us with their poise and balanced flight and the sight of the Three Rondavels nestled against each other in the early afternoon light was spectacular.

Our journey on to Wakkerstroom was a fairly relaxed drive, although long but we noted the changes in the pasture and vegetation as it transitioned from dry and khaki to light green and eventually deep emerald at Wakkerstroom. Thank you must go to Michael Kumako, Idah, Nelke and Keith Macivar at Sefapane, Brenden Pienaar at Kruger to Canyons and André Steenkamp and Kristi Garland at Wakkerstroom for having us and for all their hospitality and hard work.

Kind regards
Ashwell Glasson