A Twitcher's Trilogy (3) - Emissaries of the Sunset

Little Greenbul (Andropadus virens): Udzungwa, 1880m. Photo © 2007 Louis A. HansenPerhaps the noisiest, definitely the most secretive, avian denizens of the Minziro forest pools are the several pairs of brilliant White-spotted Flufftails (Sarothrura pulchra). Flufftails are boldly marked forest-dwelling crakes with astounding voices. All seven species of these hooting, moaning or rattlingly ventriloquial Sarothrura forest crakes are notoriously difficult to see; even by those bird tour guides who resort to both play-back and the sedge trimming of sight-line corridors. White-spotted Flufftail: Photo © 2005 Robert van ZalingeThe hooting and wailing "poop-poops" of two or more individuals of this western species sound, when they are particularly excited, as if a whole bunch of barbets have fallen from the forest canopy into the emergent vegetation and started a stooshie with an irate Moorhen. It was not until late on the third day (February 19) that we finally "got to grips with" these crakes; although we had heard them frequently enough and throughout the forest; however on the third day we saw them just incredibly well. Had they just become used to our peculiarly motionless leucistic presence? Or was it perhaps because we had finally persuaded our absurdly restless, and somewhat malodorous, forest guide to stay behind, drinking chai and chatting with Dismas and the kids, back at the car?

Whatever it was, at about 1800hrs, Tommy and I were treated to utterly "crippling views" (C20: ironic twitcher usage) of a presumed pair of these superbly skulking Sarothruras. First a gorgeous chestnut-maroon male, with incessantly flicking tail, appeared in his two tone sequined waistcoat. He stalked brazenly back and fore on the open muddy fringe of the middle pool then crept under the buttressed arches of a partially rotten tree stump reappearing less than twenty feet from us. Some moments later a herring bone pin-striped rufous female came out; and she proceeded to bathe directly in front of us, in open water beside that same stump. We could clearly see the big drops of water rolling slowly off her trembling back as she ducked and curtsied on wobbling grey legs, standing there in the reflective water (the colour of light soy sauce) bathing in full and uninterrupted profile. What utterly outstanding birding!

The nervous "tsweee-tswi-tsweee" of a Green Sandpiper (Tringa ochropus) announced our only wader, a study in black and white, a 'wintering migrant' all the way from a springtime song post deep in Russia taiga. It visited the pools each evening but only once was seen to take an anxious bath. A single Blue-breasted Kingfisher (Halcyon malimbica) was often heard around the pools. Far more than a beefed-up Woodland Kingfisher this western forest kingfisher sports a glorious, fearsome black and red bill, and a bandit mask to match. On two occasions, both quite late, it came to plunge bathe, dashing down from a sinewy U shaped liana to momentarily splash into the deeper middle pool.

Each afternoon at about five fifteen individuals from the local flock of sharpest White-throated Bee-eaters (Merops albicollis), White-throated Bee-eater (Merops albicolis): Photo © Andy Ashford. Nigeria http://www.flickr.com/photos/seth_of_rabi/wintering here from breeding grounds in the northern Sahel, arrived at some dead snags high above us and would then, after much nervous calling, begin an urgent group session of deep-dive plunge bathing at the inner pool. Accompanied by much reedy wader-like trilling they would pause afterwards to bill-tip the bare branches, tip-tapping from side to side, in some collective expression, perhaps in recognition of a dangerous duty expertly done.

The bulbuls were both the largest group, in both total number of birds bathing and the number of species involved, and also the most conspicuous bathers at the forest pools. Chiefly they frequented the farther two, and only a few individuals of the four smaller Andropadus Greenbuls (the greenish-greyish-olive, or are they olive-greyish-green?) came to the shallow leaf-filled pool, the one nearest the road. Many bulbuls would arrive early however, and some individuals stayed really late. Usually there were a few Andropadus at the pools when we arrived at five; and there would be two or three just a-shaking and a-fluttering, just drying-off, as we departed in the gathered gloom at ten past seven. During our six hours of observations it was possible to carefully compare their features in various light conditions. Those near-invisible features of the widespread and common Little Greenbul: Photo © 2007 Louis A. Hansen. Udzungwa Mts, 1880m.Little Greenbul (Andropadus virens), a species with which I could already claim to be familiar, and both the common and distinctive western Yellow-whiskered Greenbul (A.latirostris) and the far scarcer, and very sombre Little Grey Greenbul (A. gracilis) and even the slightly brighter Slender-billed Greenbuls (A. gracilirostris).

The most abundant bird species bathing at the pools was undoubtedly the Spotted Greenbul (Ixonotus guttatus) and this is a very different bulbul beast indeed. If not exactly tame, they are nevertheless very conspicuous, as they are very boldly marked (their outer three pairs of tail feathers almost entirely white; broad white tips to each tertial and to many wing coverts) Slender-billed Greenbul: Photo © Yann Kolbeinssonand they travel in big gangs announcing their presence with a veritable din of rhythmical chattering and high-pitched ticking and spitting notes uttered almost in unison. They arrived early (before five) and moved in a rolling wave of birds, down through the forest middle storey, to the dense riparian tangles on the opposite bank, behind which on the first two days they bathed in secret, hidden by the tropical greenery. On the last day however they treated us to a group bathing session in partial to fully open view among the branches and scattered pink-flowered persicaria clumps in the centre of the middle pool.

The 'best' bulbuls however were of course the biggest and the rarest two; the two species of highly nervous, low slung 8.5 cm yellow-breasted, greenish-backed Bristlebills who, being secretive dwellers on the dingy forest-floor, came to bathe much later than their more nonchalant Bulbul brethren. We saw what we assumed to be the same group of eight, or maybe there was nine, Yellow-eyed Bristlebills (Bleda ugandae) arriving each day some time after six fifteen. They came in low and stealthy, leaping through the fallen tangled branches, always from the far side. Reticent at first, they became appreciably tamer; as very gradually they accepted our undoubtedly abnormal presence as a benign one; filing down to the branches lying half-submerged at the water's edge. Here they would churr and tack in a nervous subdued manner before finally taking the plunge and bathing in the open from those branches. They would constantly flick their broad tails, flashing bright primrose yellow corners in the gathering gloom and, cocking heads in our direction they would reveal a dark and natty face pattern, and gleaming yellow eye, far brighter than the illustrations in the bird guides. On the second and third evenings a single Red-tailed Bristlebill (Bleda syndactylus): Photo © Niels Poul DreyerRed-tailed Bristlebill (Bleda syndactylus), with its distinctive large patch of blue supra-orbital skin, would arrive silently after sunset and bathe briefly and nervously together with the late-coming brown and rufous deep forest thrushes, at the brown and leafy pool, before bounding up the red and earthy bank, flicking a broad red earthy tail in the last refracted light of day to disappear over the rim into the densest of jungle glooms.

Over the course of the three evenings we saw all three species of Illadopsis, a group of seven or eight rather similar looking and, so we're told, nondescript african babblers of the forest understorey which occur in the Kagera region. On the 17 and 18 February we saw two Scaly-breasted Illadopsis (Illadopsis albipectus) at the pools which, judging from their frequently heard calls, are the commonest species in Minziro forest. On the last day however they completely failed to show. And yet amazingly we were able to watch not only a single bird of the nominate form of Pale-breasted Illadopsis (Illadopsis r. rufipennis), bathing and preening right beside us for many minutes sometimes at the minimum focus of our binoculars, but also a pair of rather squat and dumpy Brown Illadopsises (Illadopsis fulvescens ugandae), who hopped on outsize feet back and forth along the muddy margin beside the male Flufftail, before bathing very delicately from a semi-submerged branch at the farthest corner of the middle pool.

One species of that most enchanting group the long tailed ant-thrushes, or if you prefer, the rufous thrushes, came daily to the pools and another species came on each night but the first. By February 18 we reckoned on there being a total of eight individuals of the western White-tailed Ant-Thrush (Neocossyphus poensis) bathing at the middle pool. The eastern counterpart known as Red-tailed Ant-Thrush (Neocossyphus rufus) was represented by just a single bird at the middle pool on 18, and by two birds together on 19 February. On the first day the White-tailed, and on the second day both species were very shy bathers indeed, coming cautiously and very late, yet by the third day they both came down much earlier and stayed far longer affording breath-taking views. Surely they too were becoming habituated to our peaceable presence?

The varied membership of the Turdinae the chats, robins, forest robins, thrushes and robin thrushes of our world holds a very special place in my affections for reasons that are not hard to discern. Foremost I imagine that they remind me in so many subtle ways of how I developed a 'special relationship with nature' through many of the Old World's finest, and most familiar, songsters. However the afrotropical forest species are often very shy and can be as hard as hell to see under normal circumstances. Despite that fact, in the three evenings at the pools, we saw, and saw so very clearly, two species of Alethe and two species of Robin, together with a single Blue-shouldered Robin-Chat, allegedly the hardest of the Cossypha genus to see well.

Brown-chested Alethe: Photo © Itai ShanniThe commonest 'thrush' was the rather stupidly-named Brown-chested Alethe (Alethe poliocephala) a bird of whom the illustrations in the books are unspeakably bad. For the Minziro birds at any rate have lovely rufous-chestnut mantles, clean white throats, darkest cheeks and crisply shining white supra-loral stripes. Very handsome, a real 'Palearctic birder's bird' these are. This is a species which is easily overlooked, even whilst trawling the jungle floor with play-back. We reckoned on no less that twelve individuals in total coming down into the open leafy pool to bathe. By the third evening one or two would even bathe directly below our very carefully selected 'sniper's position', in full view, and only a couple of metres away! We spent many breath-held moments, elbows braced against a knee or tree trunk, soaking up their very special chocolate chunky beauty.

The other 'Alethe' in Minziro, the Fire-crested Alethe (Pseudalethe castanea), was much rarer. We reckon we saw two on the second day, and that a total of four came in on the third evening. As they came to bathe at the leafy pool, and twice to bathe just below our position on the bank above the middle pool, we could clearly see their fiery crowns fluffed out as they shook themselves wet and dry. Strangely despite their scientific name of castanea they seemed far less chestnut coloured on the back than their close poliocephala relatives, who would often be bathing right there beside them. On the second evening 18 February, I was hardly able to believe my eyes when an ambition bird, a dumpy little grey and orange robin (Sheppardia cyornithopsis) hopped up onto the climber above the leaf filled pool. I whispered insistently to Tommy:

"Look! There beside the Fire-crested Alethe. It's a Lowland Akalat; on the hanging vine. My God it's down at the pool now, and in the same field of view!" And on the third evening a second, slightly duller individual, came in to bathe soon after the first bird appeared.

Incredibly the selection of 'thrush birds' was even better on 19 February. Just around sunset, at exactly the same spot, on the brown and leafy pool, a far brighter bird, similarly-sized, tangerine and white below and slaty grey brown above with very dark cheeks and a white pre-orbital spot, an Eastern Forest Robin (Stiphrornis xanthogaster) appeared suddenly, out of nowhere there on the leaf litter, and then bathed in this the shallowest, most open pool together with both the brighter of the two Lowland Akalats and a gleaming-crowned Fire-crested Alethe! Moments later on that final evening, our minds alight, a deep forest Blue-shouldered Robin-Chat: Photo © David Margues (Cossypha cyanocampter) which, as I've said is arguably the toughest of the widespread Cossypha Robin-Chat genus to see well, came to bathe. We watched it closely perched up, just below us, immediately after it arrived and just before it left, although we could not see it whilst it bathed, as appropriately it kept itself well hidden among some clumps of knot-weed in the middle pool.

At least two sooty grey Dusky Elminias, otherwise known as Dusky Crested Flycatcher, (Elminia nigromitrata) were present at the middle pool each evening, and were watched on occasion plunge bathing, as were four or five Red-bellied Paradise Flycatchers (Terpsiphone rufiventer) on each day and a single male African Paradise Flycatcher (T. viridis) who came in on the last day only.

In addition to all the frugivores and skulking obligate insectivores, to those forest birds mentioned above, two species of 'jungle weaver' came to the pools each day to drink and bathe. The highly adaptable Black-necked Weaver (Ploceus nigricollis) came in pairs to bathe, whilst the locally widespread Vieillot's Black Weaver (Ploceus n. nigerrimus) was for some reason represented by immatures and females only; perhaps the blacker than black males were defending their nests from kleptomaniacal neighbours. Finally, but not least in our affections, a fabulously thick-billed and quite effective skulker, in the form of a male Red-headed Bluebill (Spermophaga ruficapilla) came down to drink or so we think, Red-headed Bluebill: photo © Greg & Yvonne Dean/WorldWildlifeImages.comearly on the first evening, for sure we found him skulking, in rank herbaceous growth close by the middle pool, but he at least of all these birds was never seen to drink nor bathe.

Some hours later back at Kyaka in the "Comfort Zone Motel" we collapsed into our beds exhausted and utterly exhilarated. Most of the day we had been following elephant trails in an unsuccessful attempt to reach what we hoped would be gonolek-infested Papyrus beds beside the Kagera river. Hour after hour, until we lost the scent, we had carefully picked our way round the buttressed boles of so many giant trees, inside a moist tropical forest scarcely changed since our human origin hereabouts. Hours after abandoning that quest in early afternoon, from about five until well past sunset, we'd been treated to a third (and best) evening of unforgettable bird-bathing experiences. We had watched shy and magical forest birds appearing, one after another, just as if they were emissaries from the other side.

And thus I believe it is that some birders, at the end of the day we're just simple twitching souls, find peace.
For of a perfect evening, such as this had been, as your head hits the pillow and those weary eyelids close, the brain may conjure 'a primitive' kaleidescope. Memories of ecstatic moments in tropical bird-waves resonate; pure energetic vibrations of the chase that's passed. Their images appear before you once again then silently they leave. Rising and falling, these wonders depart, flickering across your tranquil pool to settle in the deepest zone of consciousness.

Perhaps one day at an certain hour, maybe many years later, ghost-like these evanescent beings, your feathered kin, will rise again to escort you on that journey to a land where there is no threat.

Is there a better way to freedom?

On that note I'll end this trilogy which I'd like to dedicate to the enduring memory of Peter Grant and his great love of birds, particularly the gulls.