Frantic Naturalist

Photographing Sunset

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 20:31:00 +0000

Photographing Sunset, a photo by Namibnat on Flickr.

It has been an amazing year for the Namib, with a massive amount of rain all over the place. Much of the desert has been transformed into a massive grassy plain.

Earlier this month I had the chance to guide a short trip through the NamibRand Nature Reserve - this image was taken of my guests camera waiting for the sun to get down to the horizon.

Windhoek Star Trail

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 20:41:00 +0000

Windhoek Star Trail, a photo by Namibnat on Flickr.

Just a new star trail I did recently. Insomnia made me do it.

Swakop River Sunset

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 19:32:00 +0000

Swakop River Sunset, a photo by Namibnat on Flickr.

A brown sea as the Swakop river reaches the Atlantic, creating a beautiful sunset setting.

Moving on

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 17:26:00 +0000

Our company, Frantic Naturalist Tours and Safaris, is up and running. We are only doing bookings at the moment, but will later start to do tours and other interesting things.

I have created two new websites and will be blogging there. As a result, at least for the time being, I will no longer post anything here.

My new websites are:

See Namibia

See Namibia is a website that I am putting up as much information about Namibia as I can. The main aim is to put up a lot of nature related information. I have two main threads, a blog [you can subscribe here ] and a topics section [ to which you can also subscribe ]. Have a look and send me feedback if you like. We take tour bookings for self-drive and fly around trips through the website. I may clean up and re-publish some of the old favorites from this site there. I don't want to make See Namibia 'all business' and hope that some of my interest and personality comes through. You don't start a company called Frantic Naturalist if you don't plan to have a little fun?

Sandcurves

Sandcurves is a purely personal blog where I will jabber about things like programming and birding, raising kids, working out and any old stuff. It might be rather boring. I'm not to worried about feedback, but if you want to have a chat or get to know me a little better, that's the place. You can subscribe there too if you like.

Random African Bush Stories

African Bush Stories will keep going as it does now... when I find any interesting story, I'll put it up. Please, please, if you have any adventures in the African bush that needs to be told, I'm very keen for guest posts on that site. You can get a link back, or, if you happen to be in Windhoek, I'll buy you a cup of coffee. Write to me at vernon@see-namibia.com. You can, of course, also subscribe to African Bush Stories.

Twitter

You can follow me on Twitter - @Namibnat. I tweet as much about my kids and the weather as I do interesting thing, but hey, sometimes I think there are gems in there.

You are all super cool people for reading and subscribing to this blog (at the time of posting this, the blog has 42 subscribers...for a blog called "frantic naturalist" that's good going.) I've got some work from it, so that's great. I learned a lot. I had fun. It is really thanks to the links and recommendations.

Thanks

On Tour 2010

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Tue, 18 May 2010 16:58:00 +0000

I'm on tour and this is my first for 2010. I am currently at Wolwedans on the NamibRand Nature Reserve. I'll meet my guests tomorrow and head to Sossusvlei Desert Lodge. I have nothing much to do at the main camp at Wolwedans...hence the blog post (there is an internet room here.)

I had spent a few nights in Etosha with the guests before they flew down here. It was still rather wet in the park, and some drives we didn't see much. But we did have a few really good sightings. At the Okaukuejo waterhole we saw both white and black rhino together. We also saw a Giant Eagle Owl, which I hadn't seen at Okaukuejo for some time. We moved on to the other side of the park and stayed at the lovely Mushara Lodge. On our very last game drive we managed to see a leopard! My first for 2010.

I have been busy working on starting up Frantic Naturalist over the last few months, and while on tour now found out that some of my last paperwork has been approved. Look out for more to come as I get the company up and going. I'll mainly start with just bookings for self drive tours and then build from there.

30 Things To Do In Swakopmund

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 12:05:00 +0000

In response to a question about things to do in Swakopmund, here are 30 things to do in Swakopmund with a heavy dose of my opinion.

Swakopmund and the coast have become Namibia's adventure towns, and there are a number of activities available. It is a strange town, of some 40000 people, one of the very few towns along Namibia's entire, huge coastline. Often foggy, it is popular with locals in summer to escape the heat of the interior.

1. Skydiving - Ground Rush Adventures offers one of the most active skydiving clubs in the southern hemisphere. Most people do tandem jumps, but you can also do a static line jump. I did two static line jumps (in 1998...a while back now) and to me it was much better than bungee jumping (Which I did at Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe earlier that year).

2. Quad Bikes - Desert Adventures is one of the most experienced companies running Quad bike trips at the coast. I personally hate quad Bikes with a deep passion...but it is very popular in Swakopmund.

3. Sand-boarding - I know people. If you want to do sand-boarding, I can organize it for you. There are two forms usually (I may be out of data...the only sand-boarding I do is with my boys...slowly) but basically, there is lie down and stand up. Lie down requires no skill and you go fast. Since you only go as many times are you are willing to walk up the dunes, you want to make the best of the runs you get (or get really fit.) Stand up takes skill. My one day of doing it, I just fell down the whole day. I am tall and lanky, and my fitness far beats my co-ords, so lie down works much better for me. But, if you have done snow-boarding, you may find the stand-up easy.

4. Birding - This I have covered well already in this blog and elsewhere. If you are planning to visit Namibia and going birding anywhere, you should contact me anyway. I only know a few people, but I know the people who really know the people... No, jokes aside, the coast has some interesting birding. The best operators with regards to birding are Turnstone tours and SafariWise Namibia.

5. Walvis Bay Boat trips - There are a number of operators doing boat trips on the Walvis Bay Lagoon. I believe that at the moment Mola Mola has the most informative guides and most interesting trips. It is usually a morning trip out, and includes some snacks, oysters and Champaign. Dress in layers and put on sunscreen and hats even on a foggy day. On most of the trips the boat captains let a Cape Fur Seal jump on board the boat, which isn't the greatest thing, but I guess it's interesting. You see Dolphins on most trips. I recently saw my first Mola Mola, an Ocean Sunfish. It is rather strange. People have seen Whales, though I never have. In winter there are large populations of flamingos and in summer, waders, on the lagoon. The Walvis Bay Lagoon has been declared a Ramsar Site.

6. Cape Cross Tour - most tour operators run trips to Cape Cross. Cape Cross is the site where Portuguese explorer Diego Cao erected a stone cross in 1486 in honor of King Johannes of Portugal. Today the crosses standing at the site are replicas of the original cross. The site is most interesting due to the number of Cape Fur Seals there. At their peak there are nearly 200 000 Cape Fur Seals in the area. There is a great deal of international pressure on Namibia to stop a cull of the Cape Fur Seals, but to date the government hasn't taken much notice. Regardless of the politics, it's a very interesting place to visit. One thing to be aware of...Cape Fur Seal colonies STINK. If you visit you can get away from the smell and have a nice lunch (depending on the state of your stomach) at the Cape Cross Lodge.

Cape Cross is rather far out of town, and it is possible to visit the area on your way to or from Swakopmund if you are heading north of the town along the Skeleton Coast road.

7. Fishing - There are a number of operators who run fishing tours. I don't know to much about it...I can't imagine anything worse than sitting out in the cold wind, getting sunburned and then pulling out large, wet fish. But, if it's your cup of tea, there are a number of operators. Here is a link to get you started.

8. Swakopmund Museum - A very interesting museum near the lighthouse area in Swakopmund. Here is a link to some info about it...just beware...the website is a bit pink!

9. Golf - Swakopmund is in a hyper arid area, but there is a full golf course called Rossumund Golf Course. Again, I am not a golf player so can't give you to much insight into the Golf, but it's there, people like it and if it's your thing, go play golf. Just don't hit any of Swakopmund's only Springbok.

10. Swakop River Tour - You should do this trip with Charlie's Desert Tours, they started it like a hundred years ago or something. It is a very, very interesting day tour. The trip takes most of the day. Oh, just so you don't miss understand, the Swakop River tour is done in a 4x4, not a boat, and the river is a place with sand where water sometimes (but rarely) flows.

11. On Fridays you can go to the Rossing Mine if you want to find out more about Namibia's growing Uranium mining industry.

12. For the naturalist, one of the best tours is the Living Desert's tour, run by Tommy. He finds all the small creatures of the desert for you, and shares it with passion and knowledge. I have never done the trip, but people really enjoy it. Here is a video.

13. A tour to Sandwich Harbour is perhaps one of the most interesting things you can do in Swakopmund, Walvis bay area. You are out the whole day for this trip, but it is really worth it. I did a few trips for them to Sandwich Harbour last year.

14. A very interesting trip is to go into the township and visit people there. Township tours are done by Mondesa Township Tours

15. Or, if you are interested in the people living outside of the towns, there are the Topnaar people living on the Kuiseb River. I don't know exactly what tour operator is best for doing this trip, but I can find out. With any 'people' oriented tours, one wants to do it with sensitivity to the people.

16. If you want to part with lots of bucks, you could do a helicopter trip.

17. You can do scenic flights out of Swakopmund, and trust me, it is amazing to fly over the Namib Sand Sea and over Sossusvlei. There are a number of operators doing these flights out of Swakopmund, but I recommend using Scenic Air.

18. You can also do a Balloon Flight. I have never done it (in this area) and can't comment on how good it would be.

19. Shopping - well, my father-in-law has some good links on his website, Swakop.com. Buy gems, Karakul carpets, buy some property, get a haircut at Zeppelins, buy leather goods, beads, curios, safari cloths, ice cream. Don't phone me about shopping...I do my best not to go shopping. Perhaps optics...oh, yes, you can get your camera fixed (like if you got to much sand in it while down at Sossusvlei) or buy a new one (if you dropped it from your 4x4 in Palmwag). Rent cars.

20. Visit the Snake Park in Swakopmund. It's in the main street. If you can't find it, ask someone. Or Tweet me and I'll help you find it. It is interesting. Have you ever seen a real live Black Mamba?

21. Places to eat diner: Popular: The Tug (Sea food), The Lighthouse (more family oriented), Kucki's Pub, Eric's (more German). My favorite: The Grapevine (nice if you like wine) and The Wreck (a little fancy, nice setting, out of center town). If you just want to grab a pizza, the best is at Western Saloon.

22. Where to have sundowners - Tiger Reef Bar (dress warm)

23. Where to have lunch - The Light Keeper's Cottage Tea Garden...just look for the lighthouse.

24. Breakfast - At the Village Café or Café Treff. Mid-morning, have some cake at the famous Café Anton.

25. Need to blog/tweet/email, visit the Swakop icafe.

26. Scare yourself silly at the 'Flying Fox'. This is the cable slide on the top of Rossing Mountain. It is said to be the world's longest (1100 m) and highest (200 m) cable slide. It's done by the same people that runs the ballooning in Swakopmund.
27. Where to stay: Lots of places, Big hotel: Swakopmund Hotel, Historic Hotel: Hansa Hotel, really cheap: Swakopmund Municipal Bungalows, Out of center town (and perhaps my favourite): Beach Lodge, newer and nice: The Stilz. There are lots of places...Sam's Giardino, you can stay at Rossmund Lodge at the golf course (mentioned above), you can camp if you like (don't), there are many guest houses. There are even many people who provide accommodation at their houses.

30. Did you bump an elephant in Damaraland, or get malaria in the Caprivi - you can visit the Cottage Hospital. You think that's a funny link, well some time back a tourist in the area had a baby there...mom's name was Angelina Jolie. More importantly, we also had our baby there in 2007. I guess it's unlikely that you will have your baby there, but it's possible???

For more info about the coast and it's environment - visit Nacoma's website.

Doing a Nature Oriented Tour of Namibia

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 15:19:00 +0000

Some time back I wrote a blog post called Ten Reasons to Visit Namibia. The post has been one of my most read posts, and I still get a visitor or two there till now. I have also found that I spend a lot of time dispensing advice to people who write to me directly or through social media, such as Twitter. Over the last few weeks my wife and I have been working on using Frantic Naturalist to set up a web based booking office. We are still working on the details of that and I'll tell you more about it in the coming days. But the basic idea is to create an information platform to sell various things such as activity bookings, hotel and lodge bookings and so on through it.

As a result of building the website, I have been doing a lot of reading and talking about Namibia, it's various bits and pieces, the tourist routes, stuff like that. Namibia really is a wonderful country. I have been so fortunate to have seen more of the country than most Namibians would ever have the chance to do.

I am guessing that I can assume with some confidence that if you are reading this blog you have some clue as to where Namibia is (if not, I'm sorry...look it up).

I'll also assume you enjoy nature...since you are reading a blog called Frantic Naturalist.

So, just for fun, here is a mock-up Namibia tour itinerary for the Nature Enthusiast. I'll be sort of vague where I can, so that this can be used for either a top end trip, or more middle budget. I don't think it will fit to well for a cheap trip, but with a bit of help, it could be done fairly cheap.

Day 1. Land in Windhoek, travel in to town, stay (I would recommend a guest house over a hotel). If you have the energy, go out to Avis dam for a walk around. You may be interested in the botanical gardens, though they are not that interesting. Sleep well...lots of travel to come.

Day 2. Travel to eastern Etosha. If it is the dry time, basically you just want to get this done with. It's a really long drive. You could even fly it, and get a guide to meet you at a lodge east of Etosha or perhaps even organise delivery of a hire vehicle there?

If you are a birder, doing this now (rainy season - Feb, March, April sort of time) slow that first day down just enough to spend time stopping for raptors.

With good timing you could do a drive in Etosha.

Day 3 (and maybe even day four) spend doing drives in the eastern part of Etosha. I could (and probably will elsewhere) write a great deal about how to do game drives in Etosha if you are there self drive. The basic plan usually is something like:
Cover ground early in the morning, both at waterholes and away. This is the time to see a lot more of the exotic things, including cats and rhinos, that you are not likely to see later on.

Once it gets hotter and animals are slowing down, make a deliberate effort to change your approach. I think it is a good idea to go for a toilet stop at Namutoni. Then head out, but this time plan to head to waterholes and no longer aim for the exotic things. Now spend time watching whatever is there. Zebra, Springbok, Ostrich, Giraffe, Kudu, Guinefowl, Tawny Eagle, Parrots, the terrapins in the water trying to take Red-billed Quelea...basically, get the mad rush out of your head and take time to REALLY enjoy, experience, absorb the experience.

When you feel a bit sleepy/hot, head back to camp, have some brunch, take a walk around the lodge grounds/campsite. I like a place like Kempinski Mokuti Lodge for that. It is not a typical game lodge...more sort of resort/hotel...ish, but because of that there are huge grounds that you can walk around in. By mid morning there are actually lots of birds around...look for water spots. If you are at Mokuti, go to the snake/reptile park. It isn't the best (not much in the way of small stuff) but it's grounds are good for birds too.

Take some time to relax and head out for the afternoon. My afternoon plan always depended on two things, 1. What we had already seen (and what my guests still wanted to see), 2. What I had found out earlier in the day. As a guide, Etosha is always fun because you have a huge number of people who can give you an idea of whats happening where in the park.

But, usually you will want to plan your afternoon around doing about three waterholes, saving the best for last. I would say, without any knowledge of something at another waterhole, you should end with Chudop. Leave enough time for the gate - don't make a mad rush for it...trust me, you don't want to run into an Elephant...not good for health or insurance.

Day 5(ish) - the 'cross the park' day. Trust me, this day is tiring. Driving 160 km is very easy. Doing a game drive is a whole different story. So, what you want to do is do it just like any other day. Get up early and spend time looking for cool stuff while making good progress for the first hour or so. Then slow it down at the waterholes as it warms up. Then take a good break for lunch at Halali. I advise a rest there, and a swim just before you head back out to cool yourself down (remember to keep your swimming stuff handy). You could even spend a night in Halali. Sometimes the grounds staff can find owls for you...ask the security guards. And give them something for their efforts.

Mid afternoon head through to Okaukuejo for the remainder of the cross park journey. Usually this bit feels especially long. I advice just doing it straight, especially if you have a couple days on that side of the park to do all the loops and waterholes.

Once you get back into camp settle in and relax a bit. Unless it is rainy season, you want to really spend a good amount of time at the waterholes at night.

Your days here would be much like I explained for the other side of the park except that you really want to spend a lot of time at the waterhole at night, so give yourself plenty of time to rest in the day.

Day 7 or so: Heading out from Etosha, you could go a number of places, most of which are far to the west. I would suggest going to Etendeka Mountain Camp. It is a very simple, small camp on a huge area getting into the drier regions. Etendeka (and the nearby Palmwag area) is unique. One of the reasons for doing Etosha first is to get the 'mega-fauna' stuff out of the way, but the Etendeka area still has a good bit of wildlife, especially considering how dry the area is. Here you could find things like the Desert Elephants, Black Rhino, Giraffe, Cheetah, Leopard, Lions and Hyena. But you may not see any of these in a visit to the region. It is the setting, more than anything, that is just so amazing. Etendeka is set in a massive 1km thick layering of Basalt. The lava had actually flowed enough to make the volcanic rock appear to be sedimentary. It is a dark red landscape. It is one of those places that a person in a rush comes to and sort of thinks "Why did I come here" for one afternoon, and then over the next day you settle in, your mind slows down, and you find, actually, that visiting that place is the reason you came to Namibia in the first place.

Let me emphasise it, because in my experience, it is important. I learned so much of this stuff from the couple hundred travel agents I have had the pleasure of driving around in Namibia. I can probably write an interesting book about travel agent psychology, but one of the main thing is the percentage of them (lets say 30%...I think 60 or perhaps its 99%) who have the 'checklist' mentality.

It is not their fault. Most of these people don't own the company they work for. They are on educational trips and are told "Find out why people should go to ....". They come to make lists.

Etendeka isn't good for lists. But it is good for visitors for exactly that reason. It is simple. No decoration. Simple tents. Simple canvas structure main lapa. Some of the food is cooked on an open fire or in a solar oven. Water is budgeted. Have you ever taken a bucket shower? Visit Etendeka, it's special.

With enough time, you could head north from there and visit some of the more remote parts of Namibia. That is the area where you find the Himba people. You'll probably want to travel there with some of the tour operators who know the area well.

Day...after leaving Etendeka: Okay, back on my tour, we are heading back to the Twyfelfontein area, to the south of Etendeka. It isn't a long drive, so you can take it easy. In the evening perhaps do a drive with the lodge you are staying at. If you are interested in Geology, the area has some interesting sites...well documented elsewhere, so I am not going to go into detail here.

You could stay at Mowani Lodge if you are looking for a nice place. Stay one night, and, after packing up, get going early for the walk at Twyfelfontein in the morning. Then you want to make your way down to the coast.

Swakopmund and the coast is strange and foggy, but there is a lot of stuff to do. There are a whole range of adventure activities, there are some nice shops for those who are interested in stuff like that. But for the nature enthusiast, there really are lots of things to do. I would suggest going down to Sandwich Harbor, which I wrote about before.

You could also do a boat trip. Perhaps go with Mola Mola...I can't really advise at this time which is the best company.

I would stay at the Beach Lodge if you have transport. It is a little out of the center of town. Not that town is really busy, but when you have been out in the bush, it's just nice to still keep out of the center of town.

You could spend a two or even three nights in Swakopmund with ease.

Last leg: Head down to Sesriem and Sossusvlei. If you can afford it, stay on NamibRand Nature Reserve, where three nights would be very worth while. At some of the more simple places, perhaps two nights are better. I have written about Sossusvlei a few times - here is one Sossusvlei post, and you can search for others.

From there, head back to Windhoek for your trip out.

This is somewhat of a standard route, but would be a great trip.

Cool Headed Oryx - thoughts on new science.

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 07:48:00 +0000

Danger, Vernon doing science. Seriously, I am not an academic, but of course certain things are relevant and as a guide one really wants to be communicating the most correct info available at the time...which is hard if you are working out in the field. Here is something I am just getting to grips with which will have a big impact on how I guide.

The Southern Oryx or Gemsbok, the sub-species of Oryx gazella that we find in Southern Africa must have some specific adaptations to arid conditions. Some of the popular ideas about this, however, appear not to be correct in the face of new studies. Since it affects what I tell people when I am guiding, it was important to try to understand it.

Without going to much into desert ecology, lets just say an animal living in a desert environment has two main problems that feed off each other...dealing with heat and dealing with a lack of moisture. By a long way the best way to deal with heat is through some form of surface cooling through evaporation off the surface of an animal. In mammals...sweating. Works great, but what if you have a very limited water supply...obviously sweating becomes expensive.

Adaptations that relate to dealing with this double problem (heat/moisture scarcity) come in two forms, and again it is a little obvious...gain more moisture and loose less moisture. It may be obvious, but it helps to look at it like that. And of course, the implementation is a little more tricky than the concept. Of course, for a tour guide in the desert these mechanisms are a chunk of our bread and butter, and the more exotic and exciting they are, the better.

Now, a popular idea for many years was that Oryx could do something really amazing...that they could choose to stop sweating and use brain cooling through the carotid rete system. I have been telling this story for years. I love it. But, one small problem with this popular idea is that it appears not to be true.

The idea went something like this - Veins from the nasal cavity cools arterial blood going to the brain in a network of blood vessels called the Corotid Rete. This method of brain cooling occurs in a number of mammals. It was believed that Oryx could simply choose to stop sweating and let their body temperature go, even beyond mammalian norms, and have the brain stay cool enough by using this system.

The idea was proposed based on the anatomy of the brain, not because of temperature measurements. That was mainly because you couldn't measure the brain temperature of an animal living outside for a period of time as it went through it's normal duel with the environmental conditions. But now it is possible. Small data loggers can be inserted into the brain and give an accurate picture of just how much this cooling actually does.

What they are finding is that the cooling effect is minimal, and not enough to allow Oryx to stop sweating. What's more, the body temperature of the animals are higher at night, rather than in the day time. The Corotid rete does assist in survival in hot, dry places, but most likely, I take it, for periods of high activity, such as running away from a predator.

This is my understanding. I don't have good access to scientific literature (and I am not cleaver enough to always understand these things in depth). This is mainly made from reading between the lines (or reading the abstracts of papers). If anyone has any good knowledge on this or an accurate popular article, please (please, please, please) let me know...I would be most interested.

Reference:
Note: I didn't intend to write a blog post about this when I was first reading about it, and can't remember all the links I visited. I started out just trying to understand the functioning of the theory as it was, a little better. It soon became apparent that the whole thing was based on a number of assumptions, and so I started trying to dig a little deeper.

The carotid rete and artiodactyl success
The eland and the oryx revisited: body and brain temperatures of free-living animals

In Rehab

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 21:34:00 +0000

No, not me...a bunch of Raptors.

You know those things that you should have done long ago, but just didn't get around to. Right, well for me a visit to NARREC was a bit like that. I have been meaning to go for a while. NARREC had come up in a couple discussions and I just felt like I have to go and visit it. It's kind of silly, but I sort of thought of it with a bit of a sense of obligation more than anything. I had also not been feeling to good (all the green giving me hay fever, which really gets me badly when there has been good rains.) Anyway, I put out the word that I was going and a few friends said that they would join me. All of us had kids (six and down) and NARREC is really happy to take young kids.

NARREC is just a short drive out of Windhoek to the north. When we phoned to make arrangements, Liz from NARREC gave us really good directions. If you are planning to visit I would advise you to do the same. Make sure you call them before hand anyway.

We got there before it was to hot. After meeting Liz she gave us some basic guidelines and then let us walk around on our own. Some of the raptors in the cages are unable to be released in the wild again. The cages are vary spacious and full of perches and plants. They are also well spaced out, making a walk around really fun. You can see the place is set up for birders, there are nest boxes and feeders around. There was a lot of bird activity, but between managing a bunch of kids, my camera, bins and bird book, I didn't manage to watch birds out of the cages much. But it was wonderful to get such close up views of a number of raptors.

I didn't make notes (unusual for me) but these are the species I remember seeing:
Lappet Faced Vulture, White-backed Vulture, Brown Snake-eagle, Black-chested Snake-eagle,
Tawny Eagle, a number of Verreaux's Eagle (special birds!), African Hawk-eagle, Augar Buzzard, Pygmy Falcon, Gabar Goshawk (I think), a Lanner Falcon (I have seen one close up years ago, but they are special!), Greater and Rock Kestrel, Spotted Eagle Owl and my favorite of the day, Verreaux's Eagle-owl (what was the Giant Eagle-owl.) There were also some exotic parrots.

Our whole time there we were the only visitors. Afterwards we had a look at all the info they have up on display and had our picnic on their benches. The kids had a great time. All of the kids have had some exposure to the bush, and so, despite not knowing each other before we went, they had a great time. We found a couple tortoises, looked at all the bones on display, and just had fun.

If you plan to visit, make sure that you take along a donation. It is most certainly a worth while place. Often visitors to Windhoek might find little to do of interest in town. I would recommend a trip out there for sure.

I had gone out of a sense of obligation, but ended up having such a good time.

Now for something different

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 17:34:00 +0000

Okay, this has a conservation message, but I'm just sharing it...because it's fun. I can see a challenge in my future now trying to tell my boys that elephants can't fly...

Kenya reminiscing

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 15:57:00 +0000

This blog post has been sitting half finished for a while. I have been doing a lot of thinking back lately, so it fits the theme. Do you have a special childhood memory of a place you once lived? Tell me about it:

I grew up in Kenya and my parents and brother and his family still live there. I left Kenya in 1992 after finishing school and I have only been back a few times. I am not usually someone who dwells in the past, but sometimes enjoy thinking back to those days. This post was inspired by a few lines in a friends recent blog post:

When and where were you happiest?
Consciously: Kenya, 1991-1992.
Subconsciously: In any airport or airplane going anywhere.

[Reference: Living a Quotable Life ~ Feeling Vainly Proustful]

When I read Kenya 1991-1992 was her happiest time I thought it was rather sad...it's a long time ago. But it got me thinking, what was it like. Was I also happiest then? I don't think so, but it was a special time in my life and certainly laid the groundwork for who I am now. Most of all, my Kenya childhood boosted my interest in Nature.

So I thought I would share with you areas in Kenya that have a special meaning to me in terms of my appreciation for nature:

1. Korr. Don't look on a map, you probably will not find it. It is in the heart of northern Kenya, deep in the Kaisut desert. This was (and is) where my parents lived and worked with the Rendille people. When I was at home it was total freedom. Hiking and riding motorbikes around this area gave me such a deep appreciation for nature. I know motorbikes don't sound like they are to environmentally friendly (although, emission wise, they are better than cars). But it was the freedom to get out in the wild, all over the place, that made it so special to me. Thanks to Somali bandits, the area remained really remote. The bandits had no interest in the poor nomads in the desert, they were after political interests. But it meant very few tourists, very little development, not much of the modern world. We only got out first TV (in my parents apartment in Nairobi) when I was 17. TV had little to do with my childhood. We had solar lights (ah, you see, now I made up for the motorbike riding, right). So, our power would run out early most days, and we would go to bed and wake up early. It is a hot place. Really hot. So for kids who wanted to do stuff, it was important to get out and about early. We got on a mission with climbing mountains. It was amazing. I still hold on to a dream of one day taking tours through the area if the bandits left. But for now the situation remains a little poor.

2. Mombasa and the coast. We would stay in cottages as a family and spend hours in the ocean snorkling. I don't know much about what I saw. We never had field guides or anything. We just snorkeled and swam and had a good time. I love the warm Indian Ocean. It is really a thing I miss a lot on the western side of Africa. Sometime we were their on conferences, and that was fantastic...just a bunch of kids having fun. Mostly it involved late nights playing risk and Dutch blitz.

3. The Rift Valley escarpment. I did my high school at Rift Valley Academy, which was such a great location. We spent a lot of our free time in the forest. I had a really special bunch of friends, all with an interest in the outdoors. It laid a strong groundwork for my future.

4. The lakes (especially Baringo and Naivasha.) It has to be one of the most fantastic things about Kenya, these lakes. Good times were had there. Baringo is such a special place. It is considered among the best birding spots on the continent.

5. Nairobi National Park. Perhaps an odd one, but my parents spent time in conferences and workshops on a regular basis. We spent times in Nairobi National Park. Once I had my driver's license, I spent a great deal of time there on my own too.

6. Tsavo National Park. It is just such a fantastic park. I don't know what it is like now, but there was a time when the lodges were all in one small region. If you drove, you could get far away from tourists. There was less wildlife, but it was wild. I had one special trip with a friend towards the end of school. We drove out there and spent time just exploring. I really thought at the time...I need to become a conservationist. I never really did, but I did study Nature Conservation Management for four year and have become a more insightful nature guide as a result.

7. Samburu National Park (and Buffalo Springs)...special place. Grevy Zebra, Reticulated Giraffe. Stuff like that. Wonderful. It was our half way stop on the way home

and many more.

There was (is) a wildness in East Africa that isn't here in Namibia. It was a great, great country to grow up in.

White-backed Mousebirds

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 11:48:00 +0000

I have just been working on a blog called Shemimages Photo-blog for a friend of mine. I'll get back to that in a minute.

Having worked as a guide for years I think that I have become a little 'tuned in' to nature, and especially birds. When I sit here at my computer I am always listening to the birds outside. One of the most common, and often most noisy, is the White-backed Mousebird Colius colius.

Now...Mousebirds are strange and a little different for more than just their name. Mousebirds belong to the family Coliidae, a family of only 6 species. It is one of the few bird families endemic to sub-Saharan Africa. the Coliidae are the only family in the Coliiforms, making them unique to order level. There are two genuses, Colius and Urucolius. White-backed Mousebirds, are, of course, Colius.
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One aspect of Mousebird behavior that has been of interest to scientists is sunning. I don't want to do to much of a review of scientific literature here, but they sun themselves quiet often. The birds will go up to a sunny part of a bush, hold onto the branch and hang back so that their belly is exposed to the sun. They display a degree of Torpor (not much) and so there is an interest in a connection between the sunning and the Torpor. There probably isn't much connection in that regard, but it is interesting to consider. Here is a link to some work that was done on the Tierberg farm, near Prince Albert on these birds.
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White-backed Mousebirds are different, and that makes them interesting and special. They are common, though. Very. If I listen hard enough sitting here at my desk, I can usually hear a few of them.

Despite being common, I never saw one as a lifer until my first year of birding was done. I just wasn't speding time in the dry areas, and the White-backed Mousebird is a bird of the South-west arid zone of southern Africa. I was working in the Karoo with Shem Compion, on the farm Teirberg, a little way outside of Prince Albert. We worked for a couple called Richard and Sue Dean, well known arid area specialists. Richard, of course, was mainly interested in birds (If you have a look at the fat Roberts Birds of Southern Africa, Vol VII...you will see "WRJ DEAN" on the cover.

Now, we were actually there as research technicians, not doing our own research. We helped out and did all sorts of things, including measuring small details on vegetation plots and some bird observations. One thing we were asked to do was to spend some time timing the intervals of sunning by the White-backed Mousebirds. I soon saw my lifer on the 6th of February, 1997 in the nearby drainage line.

Shem and I would stay out there a week at a time, and go into town just for supplies and then be back out there. It was real immersion in the environment and had a big influence on me...big enough that I decided these arid areas are so interesting that I would spend some time in Namibia, getting to know arid areas even more (11 or so years later...I am still here). We were only there a little over a month, but it had a big impact on me.

I was always amazed at how hard working Shem was. Despite being students, with total freedom out in the bush, we set out to work each morning early, and worked really hard. And usually it was Shem who was out first.

After a long time of loosing contact, it was a real honor to help him last year with a tour. He let me fiddle a little with his blog over the last few days...check it out. Shem has become one of the up and coming guys in the pro wildlife photography scene. It isn't an easy field, there are so many guides who carry a camera and dream of one day being a wildlife photographer. But Shem has not only made it, but had started to become rather well known. He has had an image on the cover of the well known wildlife/nature magazine, Africa Geographic.

I had a bit of fun over the last week or so fiddling with his blog, Shemimages. Go check it out...you may be interested in buying some of his amazing wildlife images, his insect book, taking a photography course with him or even going on tour with him. I look forward to collaborating with him in the future again.

2010 Namibia Big Year Info

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 22:31:00 +0000

Well, as I mentioned before, there has been some interest by a number of people in recording all the Namibian birds they see this year. So far I am spending more time developing the blogs than I am birding, but I hope that will change.

So I have created an open Google Group:

Namibia 2010 Big Bird Year

Visit this group

And I have created a blog:

Visit: http://2010-namibia-birding.blogspot.com/
Subscribe: http://feeds.feedburner.com/2010namibiabigyear

I hope it will all gain momentum soon. I saw a new bird for my year today, the Groundscraper Thrush Psophocichla litsitsirupa. It was at the airport when I went to pick up my wife.

My Student days and birding

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 22:09:00 +0000

I'm just running across my stories of birding days gone by while typing up my life list. It's such fun, bringing back a flood of memories.

One of the biggest things that I notice is just how much I got around. Some of that was on my own, but there were also a number of trips taken by a bunch of us. Some watched birds, all had fun.

Some of us had been to Dehoop Nature Reserve on weekend, where I had seen a few really nice birds and I was eager to go somewhere again. A bunch of my friends were getting into fly fishing. In 1996 our house was in the forest, north of Saasveld where we studied. The houses we were in were now student accommodation, but had been a forestry station in the past. Our house was on the northern end of the row, and we had the forest right by us...and made good use of that. 1996 was a magic year. Near us we had a house of dope-heads. They had an even more magic year, but I don't want to talk to much about them, or even those houses that we stayed at.

There was a little dam just north of the houses and it was there for the forestry guys to get water if they were fighting fire. But some of my friends also thought it was good for fly-fishing.

It was fun to practice there, but sometimes one just wants to get away and fish out in small streams, high in the mountains. I wasn't into fishing, but if they were going somewhere, I was sure I would get some birds there. And, more importantly, I would have fun.

We set off in two cars. I don't remember when we got split up, but there were more serious fishermen in the one car (my room-mate's yellow Mazda 323, right?...what was it's name...or is that not blog appropriate?) I was in the second, (Mark's red Beetle...mostly with the Forest Gump sound track playing.)

We hit Stellenbosch. We studied at a place where there were foresters, conservationists, and agriculture students...there were girls, but there were very few. Stellenbosch is the most attractive University town in South Africa. It's in the heart of the wine country, with beautiful of Cape Dutch style buildings, shops, easy drive or train ride to Cape Town. There were lots of girls.

We hit Stellenbosch around sunset on a Friday. We were going to visit a while. Later that night Mark went back to his car, and watched a rubbery right in front of him. He wasn't feeling so good, and spent some time chatting to the police about what he had witnessed. By the time the whole thing was done it was really late and we were not in much of a state to find a place to stay.

We found some sports fields, parked the car and slept up on the covered bleachers. It seemed fine. We woke up in the morning to a strange sound. It was a street guy throwing up from drinking to much street brew the night before. He didn't take much notice of us...I think he had shared his bleacher with students before.

We carried on.

The other vehicle had gone on to the tunnel at Du Toitskloof. When they tried to pull over in one of the stopping bays in the tunnel, alarms went off and some police came and chased them out. It was late. They just drove past the tunnel and found a patch of grass and slept there. When they woke in the morning a helicopter was trying to land. They had slept on the helicopter pad of a fancy hotel right by the tunnel. (If my details are not exact, please let me know, those who where there.)

This was a few years before we had cellphones, and so we just drove blindly until we met up just outside the tunnel. Did some birding/fishing in that area before driving on. I added Cape Sisken to my life list...reading that just now was what made me want to write this post.

We were on our way to Rawsonville. It is a really nice wine area as well, with grapes of the slightly drier area producing different wine than you get in Stellenbosch. We had nowhere to stay (as you can see, that wasn't to much of a worry for us in those days.) We had permits to go fishing in a forestry area. It wasn't to clear, heading out of town on a gravel road, exactly where the farm ended and were the forestry area started. We didn't have permission to stay on the forestry area, but at least we wouldn't have much trouble with farmers.

The vineyards had ended, and we pulled over in the bushes and set up a little camp. The evening was fine, and we were having a good time.

To be honest, it didn't worry us to much who's land we were on, we thought nobody would worry about a bunch of students sleeping on in their bushes. We were all nature conservation oriented, so we were careful about fires and litter. We thought we were alright as well because we were students, and that was the way that your mind works when you are a student.

No, no shooting. Just an angry, really angry farmer and a bunch of cops. It was sort of cool. A couple cop cars and this farmer made it look like a scene from a TV series, but they were there to boot us off his land, and make sure we knew that what we had done was wrong, very wrong!

The farmer insisted that he wanted to press charges against us. He was seriously angry. A few of us went with the police while the others (insistently mostly the serious fishing guys) stayed behind to pack up camp. When they finished packing, they still went up fishing in the mountains.

We were a little worried. With the farmer around the Police had seemed really angry as well. He insisted that he wanted us locked up. The police sort of said they would lock us up. When they got us in the police station they sat us down, gave us a talking to, fined us a few bucks and after making sure we understood that what we had done was bad, and that if we were ever on that guys farm again we would be risking jail, if not some buckshot. Then they had a chuckle at our expense, and let us go. We headed back to Saasveld, unaware that the other guys had gone on fishing again. That night we went out to Spur and had a great chat about the weekend. I was up two birds, Cape Siskin and Klaas's Cuckoo. Klaas's was seen at our now famous camping spot on a farm by the road's edge, somewhere outside Rawsonville on the 13th of October, 1996!

I saw Olive Woodpecker in the pine by our houses a couple days later, thanks to a friend who showed me how to call them by tapping on a tree. By the 29th of that month I had seen 170 birds for my first year of birding. I have since then topped 200 within four days, but now I have much better knowledge of where to find birds, I know my book and know most of the birds, and I have a top class pair of bins (Swarovski SLC 10X42 Habicht...which, ironically, I bought September 11th 2001, learning of the 9/11 incident on our way into town.)

170 new birds may not have been to much, but there is very little chance that I will ever have a year again in my life where I get 170 lifers. Perhaps a well prepared, well funded tour of a South American country?

What we do about the birds

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 06:47:00 +0000

Yesterday I had a chat with various people who are interested in doing a 'big year' in Namibia this year. I'll be posting more about that later because one of the ideas is that each person who wants to do it can blog about their year and post a list.

But one really good question came up which often comes up in this kind of arrangement..."is there any ornithological benefit to this activity?"

Well, sometimes it is tempting to try to say something to the effect that we could contribute our sightings to some database or towards someone's research. The reality, of course, is that there is no such database (unless we actually see a bird not previously found in Namibia).

I have some clear feelings about this. I see three branches of interaction with birds that birders can get involved in. Ornithology..for sure there are opportunities to get involved in ornithology. Any zoologist studying avian populations or various other aspects of bird life in an are would often be interested in the help of a knowledgeable local. Bird, probably by a long way, have a huge contribution to the body of knowledge from non-scientists.

That's true, but on the whole there isn't really that much meaning in your daily birding activities to ornithology. When this question is asked, I often think that people actually mean to ask a related question, namely 'is there any conservation benefit to our activities?'

Here again I would say that just potting around looking at birds around the whole country has little real contribution to ornithology. Mad twitching is actually bad for the environment in a way...a big contribution to global warming with all the fuel used up doing all that travel.

Of course there is a meaningful contribution made to conservation and population monitoring by birders...a huge contribution. If you have been following my blog for a year you would know that last year this time I was really involved in counting birds down at the coast at this time.

This leaves the third, just birding for pure fun. I don't personally have any dilemma with doing birding for pleasure. Writing up my life list (which I am busy with at the moment) has reminded me of a time when I was borderline crazy with all my birding. Actually, one of the reasons for doing a bit of a big year is to re-capture that madness. It didn't matter to me if I was conserving, ornithology..ing, or even if I was any good at it. I just wanted to add birds to my life list, enjoy getting out an about, and enjoyed doing something that was a little different from the norm. I loved (and still do) birds, but it was nature more than the birds that was so compelling. I was somewhat of a 'twitcher' (depending on how you want to define that term). I was having fun, and that was important to me.

In recent times that has gone one step further. I am now really interested in people who want to bird for fun, because I earn some of my living from taking people out birding.

If you got through all my jabbering on till here, I would love to have your thoughts about birding. Why do you bird. Is there some compelling reason, just because birding is done in nature that it should contribute to ornithology. How much does cricket, rugby, soccer, drama and Disney have to contribute to ornithology?

I LOVE contributing to conservation. I have a set of personal goals or more a sort of core of focus that I want my life to be about, and one of the things clear on there is that I want to make some contribution to conservation throughout my life. I feel I have had some contribution in the past, be it counting birds or just having a chat to the conservation officials in the Namib Naukluft Park. I've picked up lots of rubbish in my life. I've given a little money to some conservation organizations either directly, through magazine or club subscriptions, or through organizations I have worked with. I haven't saved the world, but I have done a bit. And I feel a little bit chuffed about that.

I have contributed to science a little. Very little. I don't have much feeling that any old contribution to science is meaningful in a moral way. I don't pat myself on the back for any involvement I may have had in that way, even if it had been bigger. But science is fun. I am interested. Most of the jabbering on about nature I am able to do today is because of the access that I have had to a lot of information about nature.

I am also not a very good birder and don't feel to bad about that. Sometimes a Warber that you can barely see through the reeds, or a Cisticolla that will not sing or perform makes me feel like looking the other way for brighter, easier stuff. That's a poor claim for a birding guide to make, but it is true. I promise that a birding trip in Namibia with me will be interesting, I am certainly no beginner. I do 'know my birds' for the most part. I know where to find many of the countries specials. I do an okay job with a number of hard birds. But I would be really lying to claim that I was a hotshot, top-notch birder.

But when I go out to bird, none of the above affect my thinking at all. I just plain simple get a kick out of going to watch birds.

Just a little birding

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 19:19:00 +0000

This morning our Internet was down at home, so I decided to put on hold everything I am working on, and head out for a little birding. As I'm recording all the birds that I am seeing in Namibia this year, this would be a good opportunity to really get started.

I was a little late...I think I only left home around 9h00 or so. I saw a Helmeted Guineafowl (I can actually hear them now, as I sit here and type) on my way out, but not much else on the way there. I headed to Windhoek's water treatment plant (Poo farm). With all the rain in the last week, the birding is...amazing!

I love getting out there alone. You can set your pace without being worried about what others want to do. You can also crawl through more black-thorn (Acacia malifera often called the wait-a-bit bush). You can step in places that you don't with others...it is a water treatment plant. Most of the water down around the pools is actually because of the rain, not the other stuff.

A new list is always fun. I had started writing a few birds down for my big year, but since I hadn't actually 'gone birding' up until now, I rolled it back. I wanted the fun. It just isn't the same seeing birds in people's back yard.

Normal stuff, normal stuff. You write down fast to start with. You basically spend your first 20 minutes not so much birding as writing your list. African Darter, Red-knobbed Coot, Little Swift, Swallow-tailed Bee-eater, Laughing Dove....

Ah, a Hamerkop flew in. I like those. I once prepared a little talk on them when I was training to be a ranger at Phinda in South Africa. Living in the desert, I don't see them all the time, but on occasion, in the Naukluft mountain's gorges, one would catch a glimpses of this strange bird. So, it's perhaps not special to everyone, but I like them.

Out over the last pools the birding was just great. I wrote more. Tried to study some of the reed Warblers without much luck. And then, overhead an Osprey came over. It looked huge. We really don't see them that much in Namibia, though I have seen Osprey at the water treatment before. I saw this same bird a number of times during my two hour walk around the place.

Lots more. A Little Bittern...seems to be a good place to see these guys. A Diderick Cuckoo. Lots of color from the Bishops in full or partial breeding plumage. Heaps of Greenshank. I can't remember seeing such a lot together before. Common Scimitarbill. They are always nice to see.

In some of the thick grass around one of the ponds I spotted a bird that you couldn't mistake for anything. A bird that should really be a vagrant, but it gets lost so often, that you end up dismissing their vagrant'ness. The African Jacana. I have seen them at Sossusvlei, hundreds of kilometers from the closest lily pads they are so fond of walking over. But, I love them too.

Wood Sandpiper to finish a good outing to the poo ponds. I had toped 50 birds in just a couple of hours and though I hadn't planned on it, I decided that I was on a role and would just keep going. I drove through town, through the lunch hour traffic, and then on to Avis Dam. It was getting hot and there really was nothing going on. I saw a couple easy birds and then started walking around. Every time I would stop the ants all over the ground would start crawling up my legs. It seems to be like this at Avis Dam, if it rains, the place crawls with ants. So I only lifted my bins for really nice birds...and there weren't that many nice birds. Actually, there were basically no birds around. Only White-browed Sparrow Weavers and Cape Glossy Starlings, the two I already picked up from my car.

But just as I was starting to feel that I was stupid for even bothering to try to go birding at 13h00 in the afternoon I saw a whiteness to a large bush on the other side. African Fish Eagle. I found a rock in the water, stood on it, threw off the ants rushing up towards my shorts. Once I felt free, I lifted my bins. I'm a tallish dude without much co-ordination, but I do have rather good balance, probably helped by years of riding bikes, climbing hills and doing handstands. Today was the reward for all of that. I got to watch the bird nicely for a while, perched on this little rock in the water.

Hopped off the rock and walked briskly back to the car, not intending to do the ants in the pants dance. In the end I had 56 birds for the day, and for the year (I saw everything but Familiar Chat, that I have seen already this year, and I'll see one of those gardening tomorrow.) I got four raptors. A couple Steppe Buzzards were working the one corner of the sewage works, high on a power line beyond the ponds was a Black-chested Snake Eagle, and my majestic Fish Eagle of Avis Dam. I didn't hit anything super special, but to have two Eagles and an Osprey as three of my first four raptors was good enough for me.

Saasveld and birds.

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 11:38:00 +0000

I have been chatting to people a lot about birding lately. I haven't done much birding, although I hope that will change soon. My boys start school tomorrow and I am rather free.

On Sunday I'm planning to have a meeting with a bunch of people now inspired by my declaration to do a Namibia birding big year. I don't know how to do it...well, I know that I will keep a list of all the birds I see in Namibia and try to see a lot, and post it to the Internet so that you can read about it....but anyway, I'll be telling them how to do it. So, it's a bit of fun. I'll set up some blogs or something and help them be able to post their lists and birding anecdotes. I'll see later where it all goes. Should be a bit of fun.

But my reason for wanting to post is just about the shear fun of going through one's life-list years down the line. I have been spending just a little time each day typing up a few of my sightings. The notebook that I keep my life-list in is rather limited, and so the notes I took were rather...limited. But I did make some sort of note about each bird, and also recorded when I saw it and where I saw it. Just that little bit of information is SO interesting to look through years down the line.

I am busy now with a lot of the birding I did while I was a student at Saasveld. Saasveld was an amazing place. The campus is huge, with a two kilometer drive in. There is a large peace of indigenous forest right in the middle of the place. And then from there there are various bits of Pine plantations and Afromontane Forests. Higher up the hills there are patches of Fynbos, some if it really interesting stuff. And then down towards Wilderness you get into coastal scrub, lagoons and estuaries and riverine vegetation. And then, of course, the ocean. I started my life list on the 29th of October 1995 (I don't have to look it up.) And for a while I went birding mad. If you look at my list, you see some days I was birding in the southern cape,and the next in Cape town, then out to Dehoop Nature Reserve. I was all over the place. If I didn't have money (or if my car was broken) then I rode a bike. I would cycle many weekends down to Wilderness, spend time at the Malachite bird hide down there. I would take my books and think I was studying. I didn't do much studying. I saw lots of birds.

At one time we lived in a house in the forest called Gwariebos. We stayed there for a year. It was a bunch of people who loved nature, loved fitness, loved hiking. We talked about adventure and we had adventure. We were sort of misfits in Saasveld. Saasveld was a large land management campus for the PE Technikon. There was Agriculture, Forestry, and Nature Conservation. The foresters ruled the place...it was only a forestry collage for most of it's existence. The Agric guys were mainly farmers kids. Most of the Forestry and Agric guys where large guys (not to many ladies) and it was somewhat of a rough place. On the weekends a lot of these big guys would drink themselves flat.

We did party...we were students, but we did other things. We ran half-marathons and cycled from George to Cape Town, hiked, climbed, swam in the forest lakes and we really became fanatical about nature. And I mostly watched birds. It is staggering now to look back and think how much birding I did in 1996/97. A lot. Some if it was with friends, like Shem and Meiring, but often on my own. I learned a lot from the other guys, many of them were much better birders than I was. I really enjoyed that time.

One sighting really takes me back to that time. On the 9th of June, 1996, I saw my first Narina Trogon. I was in an area where these birds were probably rather common. But they are rather tricky. In the mature Afromontane forests these birds would sit high up on branches, often facing away from the birder way down below. When you are in these forests birding, you spend a lot of time craning your neck. And when looking for this bird, you do it more than most. So, you have a sore neck and look up at the tree tops. Now, just other side of the canopy (all birders reading this already know what I am talking about,) is the daylight outside the forest. These stupid birds (or clever...of course) sit right there. And they are dark green. And they don't move. And look away from you. In those large forests where they are the most numerous, you don't see them.

It was exams, I guess mid year exams (since it was June). Brian, my room mate, had the window. I was in the far corner, where his escaped snakes were fond of hiding. His desk looked out at a peace of forest, and you guessed already..on this day he just looked up and a beautiful Narina Trogon was sitting there in plain view, in a Pine tree.

That sums up so much of what birding is all about to me. I love being out in Africa's great game destinations and have been lucky enough to have seen a number of them. I have seen a herd of elephants with over 300 animals in Tsavo, I have seen a leopard in the dunes on Namib Rand Nature Reserve. I've seen lions sitting on elephant carcases. A Cape Fur Seal giving birth. Lots of special things. I have seen lions, cheetah, leopard, African Wild Dog, Elephant, Buffalo, both of the African Rhino species and many others, while on foot. But it's birding that can make me look up at the trees in my garden and have similar feelings about a Sunbird.

Have you ahd anything like that? Share some of those of moments in the comments.

Bird List upload program

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 12:41:00 +0000

I have made myself a python (programming language, not a member of Pythonidae) bird-list uploading program. At first I just wrote a console application which was rather simple and suited my needs perfectly. But I wanted to extend it so that others could use it. So I built a gui (graphical user interface, again, not a creature.)

It is not a very fancy thing. All it does is give you an interface:

You get fields for common name, scientific name, day, month, year, place, town, country, and notes. This gets posted to a mysqlite database. From there you can get it build an html page for you with all the info from the database. You can see an example of what it does here [a bit of my life list]

You can preset year and country from the terminal (command line) if you want, and you can also pre-set place while running it. You can also edit the database easily if you made a mistake or want to change things.

Requirements:
Linux (well, it should work on Windows and others, but I haven't tested yet)
Python2.6 (around about) - if you don't have Python, and want it, download it here: http://python.org/download/
(Quick sales pitch: If you have the slightest interest in programming, you really should have Python. It is just the most fantastic language to work with.)
Sqlite3 - it is bundled with Python. Sqlite3 is so easy to use that you don't even need Python to work with it, you can do stuff just with the database and work with it in your console. I do that often for birding stuff.
wxpython - is a gui wrapper for the C++ wxwidgets, and gives a fantastic api for writing gui aps. If you don't have it, get it here http://www.wxpython.org/

Even if you are not a programmer, and want to get it running, you should be able to get python and wxpython up and running on your system without a hassle. If you run Linux, it is very likely that you already have python anyway. Don't Macs also come with a version of Python installed?

Then you will need the program itself. You can get it here. For now this is how you need to deal with it:

Download it to where you want.

Open your terminal and cd to that file. It should be called Blupy-0.1a.tar.gz
un-tar with:
tar xzvf Blupy-0.1a.tar.gz
Don't install it yet. You can, if you like, run 'python setup.py install' but really it's not going to do anything very useful.
Now just cd into the Blupy-0.1a directory. Run the main gui with:
python bird_up.py

I would be really interested in any feedback from someone using it. If you want to help my packaging it for windows or any other os, please contact me before doing it..it is likely that I have already added some stuff. For every 10 birds I upload to my lifelist with it, I write 25 lines of code. I always have new ideas.

If you have a look around the code, in the bird_up.py file you will find a reference to some stuff that I want to do. If you want to do it, go ahead.

There are many types of extensions that you could build once you have this basic framework. You could create multiple tables in the sqlite3 database, you could change the configuration for bird counts, you could (and I want to do this) put an optional drop down list from the common name field, so that you could choose your birds from a list instead of typing them in. I you want to write patches, I am busy working on managing that (still don't really understand all that stuff, but getting there). If you want to build stuff onto it, go ahead. I have put it under the GPL3 license, so you can basically do what you want with it. But I would most appreciate anyone who has ideas for what they would like to do with it, so that I can add more stuff on to make it more useful.

One of the reasons that I want to release it as free software is just that I don't believe that there is much market for it. However, there may be a specific need of some organization where this could be a useful idea to build something around. If you are interested in getting help on something like that, let's chat..leave a comment or email me.

Even if all of ...one.. person ends up using it, it is a fun thing and makes it much easier to get stuff up on the Internet on into a file than typing at a spreedsheet. I do hope someone finds some use for it.

Ah, bugs, yes, let me know. Spelling mistakes, whatever.

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 08:04:00 +0000

Tomorrow is the start of 2010 and I will begin my quest to see as many of Namibia's birds within the year as I can. I look forward to that. But I also plan to do many other things, and that is the subject of this post.

I always enjoy thinking back over the year and working on my plans for the next. So, 2009 highlights...trip to Etosha with astronomers in April to try and record an occultation of Pluto was by far the most interesting thing I did this year. I enjoyed meeting up with an old friend (Shem Compion) and doing a tour for him. I spent time at Sossusvlei Desert Lodge. And I spent a lot of time learning. Most significantly, I have learned PHP (okay), JavaScript (quiet good) and Python (really well and hoping to do more work on that.)

My goals, then, for 2010...learn Python through and through, start getting a little beyond the basics of C, get into birding more than ever, workout more, do interesting tours, get my PPL (and somehow scrounge the money together to do that) and a bunch of more personal stuff. Each year I sit and write out my goals and key success factors for the year, and I find it a fun, reflective process. I can look back at years worth of goals and realize that I have come a long way and done interesting things.

I plan to blog more at Sandcurves.com this year rather than here. There I will talk about nature and tours, but also computers/linux/programming and also fitness and stuff like that. Basically anything that interests me. I don't expect many readers, it's primarily for me. This blog will still be here, and I may add stuff from time to time.

Have a wonderful 2010!

Fun sighting

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 05:12:00 +0000

Just back at Sossusvlei Desert Lodge I picked up my first lot of guests last night as they arrived by Cessna at the runway. On our drive back to the lodge, I saw a snake move off the road. I didn't break in time and so reversed back. I asked my guests if they minded seeing snakes - I have learned that some people just hate even seeing a snake. No, they were fine with it. So I looked back to the spot where the snake had moved away.

I had seen that it was a Namib Sand Snake, and really didn't believe that I had much chance of finding it again. But it is always worth trying. One could at least have a look at the tracks.

But, to my surprise, there was a small snake there. As I got alongside the snake, I could see that it wasn't moving much. It was alive. And there was some blood on it's neck. Did I drive over it? No. It didn't look driven over and was still alive, but not well. I caught it with ease and we had a look.

The snake was a Dwarf Beaked Snake, a special small constrictor found in this area. It had been bitten and perhaps strangled by the other snake, that, had we not interrupted, would have eaten this little one.

It was a rather nice sighting for the start of a stint working on NamibRand again.

Windhoek Birding Big Day with &beyond

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 02:12:00 +0000

I had the fortune to do a birding big day with the Windhoek &beyond team. It was a little strange because they were busy that day and the birding took place between visits to the office. We only birded a total of about four or five hours and managed a total of just over 70 birds. I would guess that a little better preparation, more time birding and a little more Windhoek birding esperience, a birding big day team should be able to manage around double that? I guess I will have to see next year. A local expert would have helped....I am planning to be one next year, or the next, or a few years from now...a work in progress.

Big Year plans

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 17:07:00 +0000

One of my favorite books is 'Big Year' by Mark Obmascik. It just captures the excitement of birding so nicely. I don't want to get into the discussion to much about competitive birding. My simple argument - we are encouraged to be competitive in sport, business and in many other fields. Do it in a nature related field and suddenly it is wrong?

Anyway, I am planning a Namibian big year for 2010. The challenge - see as many of Namibia's birds in the calendar year 2010 as what I can. I don't plan to do strange trips all over the place, perhaps one or two. Nor do I plan to spend a lot of money on it...but I may. I'll see how it takes me. I do plan to have fun doing it and hope to crank up my birding knowledge which really needs some work.

The good thing...as far as competitive birding goes, is that I don't know of anyone who has done a big year before in Namibia. It may well be that someone has done it? My main purpose is to re-invent birding for myself. Well, I will keep you posted when I get started.

Pelagic Birding Trip

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 18:20:00 +0000

In Namibia a pelagic birding tour is a rarity. I have been trying to get on one for years. Last weekend I finally got the chance.

I recently joined the Namibian Bird club again, and did a short little walk with them one weekend. The next thing was a pelagic boat trip. It was the first that they offered. Of course, I jumped at the chance.

We decided to make a weekend trip out of it and so we all went down to the coast and stayed in Swakopmund. On Saturday I went through to Walvis Bay to do the trip. The weather was fantastic. That is rather rare at the coast. It was also not what we wanted. With almost no wind none of the larger pelagic birds would be out and about.

That was exactly how the whole trip turned out. We had great weather as we headed out to sea. We went about 45 kilometers from Walvis Bay and saw a few White-chinned Petrels, Sooty Shearwaters and some Skuas, but nothing I had not seen. We were lucky to see a Penguin, about as far north as they come.

One the trip we had a couple 'experts' who were not to worried about what we did or didn't see and most of the others were happy with the couple birds we did see and spent a long time getting the hang of the id of the three or four new birds they saw. I never mean to be the 'twitcher' but on this occasion the whole point of doing a trip out to sea was to see stuff that we didn't normally see. I was disappointed. I thought perhaps the 45 kilometers was way to short. The boat skippers always use the short trips as case and point about why not to do pelagic trips off Namibia's coast. I think that they are wrong. People have been seeing amazing stuff just a little further out. Where we turned is still short of where the hake boats start fishing. I can't help but think that the area around the active fishing boats is where I would like to go. So, I will have to leave that to another day.

Of course, all was not lost. I saw the largest group of dolphins that I have ever seen in my life. Perhaps around 50 or more Haviside's Dolphin swam near the boat. It could have been 100. It is really hard to tell. It is hard enough to judge 100 springbok when you can see all of them...to try to judge the numbers of animals that are all ducking under the water is a different matter all together. Plus I have no real experience with Dolphins at all.

Well, no new birds but a good trip anyway. I will be heading out to Sossusvlei Desert Lodge of the 15th and will certainly have a few things to write about then.

What Is So Special About Deserts

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 09:16:00 +0000

Long time readers of this blog would have noticed that I have a special interest in deserts. A lot of that has to do with how I grew up, but I have often found that many nature enthusiasts don't think of deserts as being that interesting. I'll just share some of what makes it special to me, from a nature oriented point of view.

1. You see everything. One thing that has been really fun for me over the years has been to learn about the behavior of animals that I have had the great fortune of seeing on a daily basis.

One animal that stands out is the Oryx, a arid-adapted antelope that is so special to the Namib. They are attractive just to look at, but I have come to appreciate so much more about them simply because I have had the opportunity to observe them well. The reason why it stands out to me is because if you are in areas that are more thicket like, you only witness small amounts of behavior and then the animal disappears into the bush. And often that behavior that you see may be influenced by the presence of people and vehicles.

In the desert you see thing from far away, far enough that your presence has little influence, and open enough that you can sit and watch the whole interaction play itself out. It really becomes small simple things that you appreciate. One thing that has been fun to observe is simply when a herd moves form one bull's territory to another's. There is a whole host of interactions that goes on...the old bull walking right to the edge of his territory, watching them go, the other bull waiting in anticipation. Then he starts to sort out the young males, making sure they stay well away from the interesting females. Then checking each female, and getting varied responses. The whole process can take a long time.

That's just one example, and of course there are many other things that you just get to observe better than you would in the 'bush'.

2. It's simple. This isn't always so correct, but you get a great feel for ecology and interactions on different levels, because there are fewer things to confuse the whole process. It's a bit hard to explain, but the ecology is a little more fun to try to understand because there isn't a lot of factors to consider.

3. This one is special to the Namib, but you get to observe all this wildlife with amazing landscapes as a backdrop to the whole experience.

4. It's less irritating. Go birding in African woodlands, and after a short walk you have little gnats and things in your nose and ears while you peer at the birds in the canopy. Sure, there are things like that in the desert, but to a large extent you don't have so many bugs to bother you while you are out on foot.

5. It's all special simply because of the aridity. Every animal, every plant, all this life in the desert, all of it has to deal with significant aridity...the problems of temperature and temperature control with limited water and often limited food sources. Life is harder, and yet many organisms embrace it.

6. One thing that was special to me about the Namib, and I think this doesn't make is stick out from other deserts, but rather from ecosystems that have more commercialization...deserts are still rather unknown. Especially the so called "Pro-Namib" area that I got to know, isn't well known by scientists, and there is very little knowledge about it within the public in general. It means that you have the chance to get a special inside look. It's a special, unique ecosystem to try to understand.

7. Because there are fewer bushes, and often sandy soils, it's an easy place to learn tracking, and animal tracks can tell you so much about an ecosystem. In the desert you learn so much about the nocturnal activity that is so important in a place with souring day time temperatures.

Enjoy Nature Alone

noreply@blogger.com (Vernon) — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 09:49:00 +0000

Noki, or Dassie Rat, seen on a walk on NamibRand Nature Reserve

I wanted to write this post some time ago. I am a very quiet person by nature, but, on the other hand, I am also sort of a people's person...I enjoy the company of people very much. When it comes to experiencing nature by far the majority of my time in nature has been with others. Having worked as a guide for over a decade, obviously the vast majority of my time was spent taking people out to experience nature in Namibia.

Other than that, I have also been out with birders, and really LOVE the chance to get to learn from some the the gurus (of which I am not one, of course.) I have been really lucky to meet really interesting people in my time, and love every minute I spend with those people in nature.

I have also got out and about with friends...and that is so fantastic. Adventure.

Already, but hopefully more in the future, I enjoy experiencing nature with my two boys. That's very, very special to me. Some of my best Namibian memories are trips to Etosha and the Okavango Delta with my family. The same is true of my growing up years visiting nature reserves with my family.

But I also love getting out alone and do it often. To me it's somewhat therapeutic. Sometimes I have a strong focus on learning new stuff or trying to understand what is happening with changing seasons and animals moving...what are they eating, who is hunting who...that kind of stuff. This may seem strange, but I also do it to keep fit. I get out and sometimes just run on the hills. When I was growing up, I spent hours walking in the desert and when I was studying I spent a lot of time getting out on my own. I love sitting in a bird hide, or hiding near natural water points in dry places and just watching it come alive. I love the challenge of finding new thing, such as new birds for my life list or simply seeing those animals you don't often see because they are small and shy. Nokis (also called Dassie Rats, but that name causes confusion), for example...little rock dwelling animals that really come out when you are still for a long time.

I find that it is these experiences that help you to learn the instinctive things about nature. You develop that much more of an authority of the region because of having experienced it that way. I believe that it has helped me become a good guide and set me apart from a lot of my peers over the years. Perhaps it just set me apart for being a little strange...if so, that's okay.

But most of all, it has helped me develop a strong passion for nature. I have strong feelings about conservation and the environment in general. I get excited about the prospect of getting out and understanding an area, getting to know what is happening with wildlife and the ecosystem in general. I am a total generalist, and enjoy taking in the experience on many levels. It's an important part of me...Frantic Naturalist.

So, I'll challenge you to do the same some time. You don't need to go to the greatest game parks in Africa. You can visit a local nature reserve, get out on a lake or river, or anywhere where nature is found. Go out there by yourself and slow right down, and take it in. Be an observer of nature, and enjoy it.