Jason Boyce,
Re-published 16 March 2020
Have you ever spent over 10 minutes on a skulker, just sitting patiently, waiting for it to give you the briefest of glimpses? OK, OK, of course. But, have you ever waited over an hour? What about three or four hours over the course of a couple of days … and then still not seen it? Well, if you’re a birder then I’m sure you know exactly what I am talking about. Birders wait, patiently, for skulkers to show, and they generally never do.
A couple of years ago my family and I had the privilege of seeing one of South Africa’s near endemic skulkers, the infamous Barratt’s Warbler. Here is a short story about the eventful Barratt’s Warbler experience.
One of my personal favourite birding locations is the little-known forest and rocky grassland-covered hilltops of Mariepskop in the Mpumalanga province. My family and I took a drive to the top one morning (high-clearance vehicle recommended), and as expected the piercing calls of Barratt’s Warbler rang throughout the dense undergrowth lining the road. At this point we had established that hearing this species, as with many skulkers, can be done with your eyes closed, so to speak. The real test however was yet to come!
How does one go about seeing this little gem? Well, persistence is key. Prepare yourself for a semi-strained neck, the occasional torn hamstring, and eventually the process should end with a sigh of relief as your eyes start to pick up the detail in the darkness. My advice would be to find a bird that is fairly close to the trail or road and move as close as you feel you can without "spooking" the bird. Sit patiently and watch for any movement in the darker sections of the bush. One can often be rewarded with views not too dissimilar from these:
Barratt’s Warbler is found in a variety of dense vegetation, often in bracken (Pteridium spp.) and heath (Erica spp.) along streams. Slowly but surely the single bird that we had locked our sights on began to emerge from the cover of darkness and, sure enough, we were treated to heart-stopping views of an unusually confiding individual, singing his little lungs out in the tiniest of gaps among a network of intricately tangled branches. To this day I am still not quite sure as to whether this specific bird thought it was a Cape Robin-Chat, a Drakensberg Prinia, or perhaps even a Cape Sparrow. Gasp!
If I had told you that all of this happened within a time span of 30 minutes, I think you would quite possibly be just as surprised as my father and I had been. This notorious skulker had finally revealed itself to us, showing off all its characteristic features while bathed in the most subtle shades of the Mariepskop dawn. This species tends to move around quite a bit (as those of you who have seen it will know), which means snapping pictures always takes a fair amount of patience – and of course a whole heap of luck.
”Wit… Wit… wit.. wit, chrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!”
As a keen photographer, I sometimes spend a good amount of time trying to get photos of species like this. Sometimes hard work really pays off!
With such a variety of habitats, Mariepskop is one of the more exciting places to visit. There is a fantastic number of bird species including the likes of Black-fronted Bush-shrike, Knysna Turaco, Yellow-throated Woodland Warbler, Scaly-throated Honeyguide and even Buff-spotted Flufftail.
Its most certainly worth a trip for butterflies too. The Lepidopterists' Society of Africa (LEPSOC) organise trips to various butterfly hotspots around South Africa each year. If you're interested in finding out more about these trips, check out thier website here or get in touch with me via email. One of the most prized butterfly species on Mariepskop is of course the Marieps Charaxes/Emperor (Charaxes marieps) which is restricted to the afromontane forest in Mpumalanga, centred around Mariepskop. A few other interesting species that I have encountered before include Forest King Charaxes (Charaxes xiphares), Christmas Forester (Celaenorrhinus mokeezi), and Kroon's Flat (Calleagris krooni)
Christmas Forester (Celaenorrhinus mokeezi)
Forest King Charaxes (Charaxes xiphares)
I for one, feel like I still have a lifetime of knowlege to gain when it comes to trees, plants, and wild flowers. Our timing must have been absolutely perfect as we were lucky enough to find a rather special flowering plant. Needless to say I had no idea what it was but the response from wild-flower expert Duncan Mckenzie was priceless: "Wow!!! Cyrtanthus huttonii!! Never seen it...."
Cyrtanthus huttonii, sometimes given the 'common name' of Cliff Cyrtanthus is a species of herbaceous plant that is endemic to South Africa. It seems we struck it lucky, the right place at the right time. My photograph below certainly does not do this species justice as the flowers seemed almost iridescent at the time.
Thanks for taking time to read this story. As I like to say, "there are always more birds (and many a lurking Barratt's Warbler)!"
Jason Boyce
© All Photographs Copyright 2020 Jason Boyce
Pretoria
South Africa
0178
Email: jason@jbbirding.com
Cell / What's app:
+27 82 585 2252