Mbour is more than just a tourist resort

blue naped mousebird, woodland, Mbour research centre

On day two of my Senegal trip we went south to Mbour research centre. This french sponsored environmental research centre is about 50 kilometres south of Dakar as the pied crow flies. It's a lot further by road.

We had special permission to enter as it is normally closed to visitors in the rainy season. Thanks to Moussa Diop for arranging this.

Mbour is close to the possibly biggest tourist resort in Senegal at Saly but is a world away. It has three habitats in close proximity. There is woodland, a lagoon and the coast.

We started with a look at some allotments before a very long long walk through the woods. Around the allotments (and later near the several clearings and on the paths) were various finch and their relatives - black headed weaver, village weaver and red billed firefinch. We also saw little weaver for the first time.

Walking into the woods, one of the first birds we saw were a small group of blue naped mousebird.  I hope you can see why it gets its name from the picture below.

rear view of blue naped mousebird

The woods are beautiful in the rainy season. I was lucky throughout my week in Senegal that it didn't rain even though it was the middle of the season. Fortunately for the locals it had rained well in the weeks before and the Savannah areas were very green.

landscape, woodland, Mbour research centre

Both local types of hornbill were present: red-billed hornbill and grey hornbill. I got my first chance to photograph the grey hornbill here.

grey hornbill, woodland, Mbour research centre

Another finch relative was seen at various points along the paths. The bird has the wonderful English name name of red-cheeked cordon bleu. This small bird is quite confiding and not difficult to pick out. 

red cheeked cordon bleu, woodland, Mbour research centre

One of the nicer things about birding around Dakar is the superior quality of their doves compared with Europe and north Africa!  The birds of prey seem to deter large pigeon populations in the city and in the woods there are some exotic species. Here I  saw the ubiquitous laughing dove but also African mourning dove and black-billed wood dove. 

black billed African wood dove, woodland, Mbour research centre

In the woodland, I suppose it was no surprise we saw woodland kingfisher and it was easily seen. We had to work harder to see a grey woodpecker which we heard (and later viewed) around a large bilbao tree.

woodland kingfisher, Mbour research centre

Another feature of West African birds seems to be a relatively larger proportion of parasitical birds. Birds such as cuckoos which lay eggs in other birds nests. Here we viewed a Levaillant's cuckoo.  But it is prehaps more surprising that the village indigobird is a parasite. I understand this attractive dark blue bird lays its eggs in the nest of the even more attractive red-billed firefinch.

village indigobird, Mbour research centre

Of course another feature of sub Saharan African birding is the vivid colours of a significant proportion of  its bird species. Two which we saw in the woods were yellow-crowned gonelek (poor photo- sorry below) and the northern red bishop. You'll have to wait for future blogs for a good picture of the latter bird which I snapped a couple of days later.

yellow crowned gonolek, Mbour research centre

After the woods we headed for the lagoon which is separated from the sea by a sand bar. (see the list of birds below for other birds seen in the woods).

The most abundant resident birds here were probably grey headed gull and caspian tern. The latter bird has a remarkable breeding distribution many breed in the baltic sea and the north of the caspian. Some breed near the those birds wintering grounds - for example in Senegal and a few even breed en route between the two places. We have a breeding colony at Farwa Island in Libya.

Grey headed gull, Lagoon, Mbour research centre

I was pleased to finally get a photo of sorts of a pink-backed pelican. These birds proved to be very shy at Technopole. Likewise they fled the lagoon on first sight of people. I caught one in flight.

pink backed pelican, near lagoon, Mbour research centre

Another resident bird seen at Technopole was the western reef egret.This bird has less problem with people.

western reef egret, lagoon, Mbour research centre

However one the biggest surprises of this visit was the presence of western palearctic migrants in mid August.  Their presence was hinted at at Technopole although the few seen there could have over-summered. There were more here and as you will read in later blogs there were many more migrants elsewhere. They seem to be becoming more common as the week progressed. The most obvious migrant was ruddy turnstone.

ruddy turnstone, lagoon, Mbour research centre

However, there were also at least a couple of whimbrel present. We had thought these may have over summered but we saw a large number later in the week suggesting they were early winterers. From a distance and without a scope we also caught sight of a few unidentified sandpipers. 

whimbrel, lagoon, Mbour research centre

The third habitat at Mbour is the coast itself. I regret that we didn't find time to look out to sea for seabirds. One new bird that we did see was actually a land bird - Vieillot's barbet in a tree where the wood grades into coastal heath. I don't think we did this habitat justice but time was short. This was a bird we could also have seen in the woods. One barbet we had seen there was a bearded barbet.

vieillot's barbet, coastal dunes, Mbour research centre

We left the research centre for a late lunch to pass the hottest hours of the day away. Then it was on to an open lagoon which turned out to be very interesting. I'll write about it in my next blog.  

List of birds seen at Mbour (thanks to Moussa Diop)

Pink-backed pelican

Long-tailed cormorant

Cattle egret

Western reef egret

Great white Egret

Pied crow

Black kite

Spur-winged plover

Whimbrel

Black-winged stilt

Ruddy turnstone

Grey headed gull

Caspian tern

Laughing dove

Black billed wood dove

African mourning dove

Senegal coucal

Levaillant's cuckoo

Blue-naped mousebird

Woodland Kingfisher

Grey headed Kingfisher

Pied Kingfisher

Little bee-eater

Barbed barbet

Vieillot's barbet

Red billed horbill

African grey hornbill

Grey wood pecker

Crested lark

Common bulbul

Grey headed camoroptera

Scarlet-chested sunbird

Beautiful sunbird

Yellow-crowned gonolek

Yellow-billed shrike

Greater blue-eared  starling

Long-tailed glossy starling

Northern red bishop

Village weaver

Black headed weaver

Little weaver

Red-cheeked cordon bleu

Red-billed firefinch

African silverbill

Bronze mannikin

Village indigobird

Red-billed quelea

Water birds at Technopole, Dakar, Senegal

African jacana - Technopole, Dakar, August

This year I have got a six week summer holiday, the longest since I left college many years ago. Although British, my work is in Libya and my home is in Bulgaria where I am resting. Actually I'm not sure how much rest there is going to be. I  have just returned from a birding holiday in Senegal. There are six or seven blogs in the pipeline about the holiday and one or two more on Libya. I am going to be busy. So here goes.

Last week I visited Senegal for the first time in my life. And it was my first birding in sub saharan Africa. I saw some birds I knew but there were many new ones. 67 new ones to be precise.

I was guided by Moussa Diop who knows his country's birds even better than I know Libyan birds. I was very impressed. Moussa is a fellow member of the African Bird Club and is Senegal's checklist recorder.

On the first day he took me to Technopole in Dakar itself. This is a surviving wetland in the heart of the city. It's a hidden, huge wonderland.

I saw so many birds there that I am forced to split the blog on this venue into two parts - the water birds and the land birds.

landscape view of Technopole, Dakar

Technopole is larger than any wetland in Libya! And its density of birds is high. On immediate impression you see egrets and cormorants everywhere (cormorant and long tailed cormorant) everywhere (great egret, intermediate egret , little egret and cattle egret). The other most obvious bird is spur winged plover. There were literally hundreds of paired plovers near the water.

Spur winged plover, Technopole, Dakar, August

The spur winged plover are not shy but they were very protective of their territories presumably they are about to breed. Many birds breed in August as it is in the middle of the rainy season and food is most plentiful.

Mostly Long tailed cormorant (great cormorant on far left)

The great cormorant were lucidus sub species which has even more white on its front than maroccanus.

Long tailed cormorant and great egret, Technopole

There are plenty of other birds there too. I saw many african jacana (see picture at the top of the blog). 

There were also many grey heron, a bird I know well but had not seen in such large numbers in one place. I also met two species of egret/heron for the first time.

Below is a picture of a black heron. To be honest I have no idea why the bird is called a heron. Its latin name tells you its an egret and it looks like a slightly smaller but black version of a little egret even down to its yellow feet.

Black heron, Technopole, Dakar, August

The western reef egret was present too. It is only found close to the coast and is spread all down the west African coast. It is apparently an even closer relative to the little egret than the black heron but to me it was the reef egret that behaved more like a heron. It stood in the same spot for ages, presumably on the look out for food just like many herons! The one below had a pair of spur winged plover for company.

Western reef egret. Technopole, Dakar

Moving on from herons and egrets, there were quite a few other species. Pink backed pelican was quite common but shy. I have photos but there are all long distance. You will have to wait for later blogs to see reasonable shots!  Incidently while I am on a rant about bird names, this one too seems a bit of a misnomer. I really didn't see much pink. The french call it the grey pelican and I think they have got it right.

White fronted whistling duck, Technopole, Dakar

It was good to see ducks. The European migrant ducks have not yet arrived for the winter (though surprisingly some other species already have - see later blogs). The duck I saw was white faced whisling duck. This name is entirely accurate! It was another new species for me.

Purple swamphen, Technopole, Dakar

However one of the best thrills of the day for me was to see an old friend - the purple swamphen.  The was my favourite bird in Azerbaijan. I used to describe it as so ugly it was beautiful. The picture above does indeed make the bird look attractive.

a family of purple swamphen, Technopole, Dakar

In Azerbaijan they were very difficult to pick out as they hid in the reeds at distance but here there were in the long grass. I got a better view here than in all my time there.

Finally there is no doubt that sub Saharan Africa has some very pretty kingfishers.

Pied kingfisher, Technopole, Dakar

Pied kingfisher are found in the western palearctic especially in Egypt but this was my first view. There are not difficult to pick out and were quite common throughout the trip!

The gery headed kingfisher seems to be equally as common.

 

Grey headed kingfisher, Technopole, Dakar

My next blog concentrates on the land birds seen at Technopole on the same day.  It includes one quite rare one which I photographed well. Which bird? you'll have to wait for the blog.