If you have a bird-feeding site in your suburban or rural garden and live in a region where honeyguides occur, the pleasure you derive from your efforts can be greatly enhanced if you can secure a source of beeswax. With an uncanny ability to track down the presence of beeswax or honeycomb, a honeyguide will become a regular visitor to the garden, even if only an intermittent supply of this unusual food source is provided.
Not only are members of the honeyguide family (Indicatori-dae) typically considered to be the only African vertebrates capable of digesting wax derived from either honeycomb (honeyguides) or scale insects (honeybirds), they also have a few other unusual characteristics. All members are brood parasites and all are probably polygynous; hatchlings have hooked bills for killing the young of their hosts; and all members have zygodactylous feet. The Greater Honeyguide Indicator indicator is renowned for its remarkable cooperative relationship with human honey gatherers, honey badgers and baboons.
Being a hobbyist beekeeper gives me perhaps an above-average opportunity to witness the connection between these interesting birds and our all-important honey bees. Recent observations at the bee-feeding site in my East London forest-edge garden have shown me the feeding and social behaviour displayed by both immature and adult Greater and Lesser honeyguides. As the birds were not individually marked, I was unable to ascertain how many independent individuals of each species and age or sex class visited the feeding site, but my observations nonetheless suggested some interesting patterns.
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EXPLORING NEW HORIZONS
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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
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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.
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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.
