Birds of Uganda

I am still a fan of birds even though it's been a long while since I've posted pictures. In fact, I've been painting one for our living room -- strange? maybe, but it makes me laugh.

When I was visiting with a friend who had been to Uganda, I asked her about the birds. She said she didn't remember any except a few at the hotel. When the Uganda kids were here in Texas, they acted as if they had never seen bugs, so I started wondering if there really weren't birds there. Once I got there, though, I realized they are everywhere as long as I kept looking.

The first couple days, I went to the courtyard in the morning and saw many, though the photos didn't always come out as well as I hoped. Some of the biggest birds I've ever seen were around the lake -- Marabou storks! They reminded me of grandpa's with the pocked pink faces with grayish white whisps on their heads. They stood at least as tall as me, though I didn't want to get quite close enough to compare... they didn't want me getting that close either. Check out the photo of my foot next to one of their feathers on the ground.

Marabou stork

There were also some interesting nests in the trees on the lake shore. One morning I actually captured a picture of the pretty yellow weavers that were living in them.

Each morning I was searching for birds at our hotel, I found at least one new type. I had to wait until I got home to identify them all though.

Sacred ibis

Gray heron

Hadada ibis

African openbill

African thrush

Pied crow

African pied wagtail

Woodland kingfisher

Glossy starling (Cape or Principe?)

We saw birds at the schools, but not too often. Usually, we were at the schools in the middle of the day when the birds weren't as active. Other times, we were just too busy for me to notice the birds when I was surrounded by children who made me even happier! (The dove nesting in the rafters of a schoolroom kept us hopping all day. We had to keep moving boxes as she kept pooping on them.)

Heuglin's weavers

Laughing dove ... (and it likely WAS laughing at US)

Nearly every day began and ended at Pastor Emmy's home. Almost every time we stopped there, this beauty greeted us - the Gray-crowned crane is the Uganda national bird. One day I decided to see how close I could get to the bird that is around four feet tall. Another time, I got really brave and got the camera in its face as it perched on top of a minivan. It wasn't thrilled that I got so close and it tried to wave me away with a wingspan of probably six or seven feet. That's how I got some of my favorite bird pictures in Uganda.

This is the one that inspired my painting

The day we went on safari is the day I felt like I struck jackpot with my bird list. I was beyond thrilled that the nature guide at Queen Elizabeth National Park was excited to have someone to share her knowledge with. Though my new friends teased me about my love for taking bird pictures throughout the week, they all soon realized how neat it could be to spot the brilliant flashes of color in flight, and it ended up being a contagious excitement to spot another bird.

Pied kingfisher

Pied kingfisher

Egyptian geese

Spur-winged lapwing

Water thick-knees

Yellow-billed stork with cape buffalo

Sacred ibis

Hadada ibises

Hammerkop

Gray headed kingfisher

Malachite kingfisher

Reed cormorant

Hadada ibis

White-breasted cormorant

Barn swallows

Lesser masked weaver

African dusky flycatcher

Olive bee-eater

Pink-backed pelican

African fish-eagle

African Pygmy kingfisher

Yellow-billed stork

African jacana

African jacana

When I got home, I spent quite a bit of time going through the African wildlife book I bought at the airport. I compared the pictures in the book to my photographs, and even had to rely on the internet to help me identify a few I took pictures of that didn't make it to the wildlife guide. In the end, not all my pictures were nice enough to bother sharing. To the best of my knowledge, these are the birds I saw in Uganda:

1. Great white pelican
2. Pink-backed pelican
3. White-breasted cormorant
4. Reed cormorant
5. Gray heron
6. Goliath heron
7. Purple heron
8. Yellow-billed egret
9. Cattle egret
10. Little egret
11. Hammerkop
12. Yellow-billed stork
13. Marabou stork
14. African openbill
15. Sacred ibis
16. Hahada ibis
17. Egyptian goose
18. African fish-eagle
19. Gray-crowned crane
20. African jacana
21. Black-capped avocet
22. Water thick-knee
23. Speckled moosebird
24. Malachite kingfisher
25. African pygmy kingfisher
26. Gray headed kingfisher
27. Woodland kingfisher
28. Shining blue kingfisher
29. African dusky flycatcher
30. Olive bee-eater
31. African pied wagtail
32. African thrush
33. Red-billed firefinch
34. Heuglin’s weaver
35. Lesser masked weaver
36. Pied crow
37. Glossy starling (either Cape or Principe variety)
38. Laughing dove
39. Barn swallows
40. Spur-winged lapwing

Bucket List: African Safari

I keep thinking about blogging about my trip to Uganda, but I keep struggling with deciding which pictures to use, or whether to do a day-by-day write up, or whether to just tell a few of the stories from the trip. I still haven't decided, but I'm a tad bit frustrated that "Uganda!" is still on my list of things to write about. So, I think I'll just do a bit at a time. It may be a little of the day-by-day style mixed with some of the special moments or just a series of photos with lots or little writing. Today, I'm ready to take on the safari!

Number 4, I think, on my list of 101 things I want to do in my lifetime is "Go on an African safari with Allen". When I saw that a safari was on the itinerary for our Ugandan mission trip, I was thrilled. Then I realized I couldn't check it off since Allen wasn't with me. I have until the end of this year to decide if it was close enough that I was on the safari with my trip roommate -- Ellen (isn't that close enough?)

We headed out from the hotel super early because we wanted to get to Queen Elizabeth National Park early, but it was a four hour drive to the part we were heading to. Along the way, we passed through such beautiful scenery -- tea plantations, jungles where gorillas live (but we didn't see any), and vast stretches of dry savanna. We saw zebra and antelope along the way, and, as we approached the park, we were greeted by a troop of baboons.

We stayed on the PCM bus driving through the park. We saw elephants, but often Driver Emmy would notice the animals after we passed them. He would stop the bus and reverse it. The loud BEEP-BEEP-BEEP-BEEP of the bus backing up usually scared off whatever we noticed in passing, so it was tough to get great pictures on that part. Driving, we saw a few elephants and a couple warthog. I saw the back half of a leopard resting in the shade of a tree, but it was gone when we backed up to see it again.

We made our way down to the river and got on a boat for the best part. The boat tour got us close to many different creatures: crocodiles, hippos, Cape buffalo, and a variety of birds. We also passed some Nile monitors, more elephants, and some more Uganda kob.

One of the hippos we saw was only a day old -- the guide had seen the mother giving birth the day before. As large as a baby hippo is compared to me, it was tiny compared to the rest of the hippos!

After a few hours of exploring the Kazinga Channel between the lakes, we got back on the bus and headed back to Mbarara. On the way out of the park, we saw many more elephants -- some passing right behind the bus -- and more baboons.

At the end of the day, we counted some of the different animals we had seen. I'll save the birds for another post, but we saw wart hogs, hippos, Uganda kobs, topi, antelope, waterbuck, Cape buffalo, zebras, African elephants, bottom half of a leopard, olive savanna baboons, Nile crocodile, and monitor lizard. We also saw vervet monkeys at the first hotel, and some kind of bat hung from the power line near the other hotel. Since I'm a little bit of a bird-fan, I'll post those separately.

 

For every animal of the forest is mine,

and the cattle on a thousand hills.

I know every bird in the mountains

and the creatures of the field are mine.

~ Psalm 50:10-11