We had another pre-dawn departure from the hotel and well over an hour of driving to get to some remnant Miombo forest around Londuimbali. A quick roadside stop as we got close to the forest patch, produced a couple of Salvadori's Eremomelas.
Salvadori's Eremomela: This is a monotypic species which occurs from the East of the Democratic Republic of the Congo to South East Gabon, the central plateau of Angola & West Zambia
The forest was an interesting area with remnant forest on one side of the road, but largely degraded cleared fields on the other side. We were initially distracted as we got out of the 4WD as Niall could hear a Miombo Scrubrobin singing from some remnant vegetation in the cleared fields. We didn't manage to find it, but did find the only Boehm's Flycatcher we saw. Had we realised that it was to be the only one, then we should have tried to get a bit closer: hindsight is a great thing.
Boehm's Flycatcher: This is a monotypic species which occurs from Angola to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Zambia, South West Tanzania & North Mozambique
The area was cleared to the left, but with reasonable patches of low dry forest on the right
The forest had all gone on the left hand side of the road
There were quite a few Birds in this forest, but most species moved through fast
The bush has managed to recover around the remains of this old building
We found a small forest path into reasonable looking Miombo forest and explored for about the best part of a mile into the forest. We eventually gave up and headed back to the road when we encountered a number of cleared fallow fields in the forest. There must have been a village further on and we were starting to reach the edge of their fields.
Swallow-tailed Bee-eater: This is the hirundineus subspecies which occurs from Angola & Namibia to Zimbabwe & Northern South Africa
Anchieta's Barbet: This is the rex subspecies which occurs in West central Angola
Anchieta's Barbet: Two other subspecies occur in other parts of Angola, Southern Democratic Republic of the Congo & Zambia
African Golden Oriole: This is the notatus subspecies which occurs from Angola to Tanzania, Mozambique & North East South Africa
Black-necked Eremomela: This is the atricollis subspecies which occurs in Brachystegia woodlands of Angola to South East Democratic Republic of the Congo & Zambia
Black-necked Eremomela: They clearly have an interesting display
Pale Flycatcher: This is the murinus subspecies which occurs from Gabon, Republic of the Congo, & Angola to the South East of South Sudan, West & South Kenya, and South to North East Namibia, North Botswana, West & South Zambia & Zimbabwe
Woodland Pipit: This is the schoutedeni subspecies which occurs from South East Gabon & South Republic of the Congo to the South of the Democratic Republic of the Congo & South Angola. I was pleased to see this Woodland Pipit as it was a species we missed in my 1990 trip to Southern Africa
The Woodland Pipit had taken up territory around this fallow field
It's a sad reality for many Angolans that they have long walks to their fields: We saw many African ladies carrying loads on their head, but this lady won the best load when she walked past us with a spade and other objects balanced on her head
By late morning, we were back at the dirt main road and decided to have another look for the Miombo Scrubrobin that we had heard singing when we arrived. After a bit of searching, we finally located it singing in a dense area of bushes. It remained on the same perch, but a perch that was always partially obscured by vegetation.
Miombo Scrubrobin: This is a monotypic species which occurs from Angola to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Burundi, Zambia, South West Tanzania & North Mozambique
Richard posing at the early lunch break: Niall had a large fridge in the boot of the 4WD, along with large flasks of hot water, coffee presses and a reasonable selection of spreads that could go on local bread. There were no teddy bears invited to our picnics
One of the distant large rocky hills
The plan for the rest of the day was to try a nearby area of wet fields. I will cover this in the next Blog Post.
