Headline news what perhaps qualifies as the best bird of the review period was southern Africa’s ninth Red-throated Pipit, which was found on the San Sebastian Peninsula near Vilanculos. The bird was present for just two days before it disappeared. The first record of this species in the subregion dates back to March 1983 when one was found at the Umvoti River mouth. This was followed by records in January 1989 at Chirundu in Zimbabwe; March 1992 at Lake Manyame, also in Zimbabwe; January 1998, again at the mouth of the Umvoti River; January 1999 at the mouth of the Swakop River; March 2008 at Serra Choa in Mozambique; January 2015 at Avis Dam, Windhoek and, most recently, in December 2020 when two birds were seen together at Gaborone Dam.
The subregion’s 18th Baird’s Sandpiper, at Macassar Sewage Works outside Cape Town, also proved extremely popular, especially when it was joined by a second individual. Originally added to the southern African list based on a specimen collected in Walvis Bay in October 1863, there was a wait of more than a century before the next Baird’s Sandpiper was found in October 1984 at Olifantsbos in the Cape of Good Hope section of Table Mountain National Park.
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EXPLORING NEW HORIZONS
Keith Barnes, co-author of the new Field Guide to Birds of Greater Southern Africa, chats about the long-neglected birding regions just north of the Kunene and Zambezi, getting back to watching birds and the vulture that changed his life.
footloose IN FYNBOS
The Walker Bay Diversity Trail is a leisurely hike with a multitude of flowers, feathers and flavours along the way.
Living forwards
How photographing birds helps me face adversity
CAPE crusade
The Cape Bird Club/City of Cape Town Birding Big Year Challenge
water & WINGS
WATER IS LIFE. As wildlife photographer Greg du Toit knows better than most.
winter wanderer
as summer becomes a memory in the south, the skies are a little quieter as the migrants have returned to the warming north. But one bird endemic to the southern African region takes its own little winter journey.
when perfect isn't enough
Egg signatures and forgeries in the cuckoo-drongo arms race
Southern SIGHTINGS
The late summer period naturally started quietening down after the midsummer excitement, but there were still some classy rarities on offer for birders all over the subregion. As always, none of the records included here have been adjudicated by any of the subregion's Rarities Committees.
flood impact on wetland birds
One of the features of a warming planet is increasingly erratic rainfall; years of drought followed by devastating floods. Fortunately, many waterbirds are pre-adapted to cope with such extremes, especially in southern Africa where they have evolved to exploit episodic rainfall events in semi-arid and arid regions. But how do waterbirds respond to floods in areas where rainfall - and access to water - is more predictable? Peter Ryan explores the consequences of recent floods on the birds of the Western Cape's Olifants River valley.
a star is born
It’s every producer’s dream to plan a wildlife television series and pick the right characters before filming.
