Mid-May to mid-July 2021
HEADLINE NEWS
Despite the cold winter temperatures, the birding action zoomed right up to boiling point when news came through of the discovery of southern Africa’s first-ever Lesser Whitethroat. It had taken up residence in the trees around the carpark outside the Amazing Kruger View Restaurant in Henk van Rooyen Park, part of the greater Marloth Park area in Mpumalanga. Fortunately, the bird stayed loyal to this fairly small area for two weeks, during which time it attracted hundreds of twitchers.
Lesser Whitethroat is a small warbler species that occurs mostly in Europe and parts of Asia and during the boreal winter migrates into some northern areas of Africa, coming as far south as Ethiopia. Our bird was a long way out of the known range and is probably the first record for the southern hemisphere. Given the time of year, it seems to have been a fairly obvious case of reverse migration, in which after leaving its wintering grounds, the bird headed south instead of north and ended up down in the south of the continent.
This story is from the September/October 2021 edition of African Birdlife.
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This story is from the September/October 2021 edition of African Birdlife.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
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