CAR has kept moving at a pace that seems to know no speed limits! A big thank you to all CAR observers have continued to give generously of their time and skills, as well as covering the high fuel costs of these roadcounts. Thankfully the petrol price did come down for the first time before the January 2009 count.
There were some very slippery and muddy routes in Gauteng, Mpumalanga and parts of the Free State - thank you so much to all of you who persevered in counting, and especially those who returned to count once the roads had become passable! Your commitment to conservation is incredible! I also so appreciate the huge role played by Precinct Organisers in arranging counts, acknowledging and checking roadcount forms and encouraging you all in continuing to count. It really helps Denise and I that the forms are far more carefully checked before submission, as this saves us a huge amount of time in following up queries - thank you!
In Newsletter 25 the search for a CAR logo was launched, but so far I have only received two possibilities, both from participants in the Grahamstown precinct in the Eastern Cape. I hope this reminder will inspire more of you to think creatively, and maybe ask for assistance from a friend to draw your ideas if you don't feel able to.
As I have mentioned before, Sally Hofmeyr is doing her PhD on large terrestrial birds and environmental change, and she is using the data you have collected to identify trends in the populations of large terrestrial birds in the areas covered by the CAR project. I am thrilled that she will be able to draw important information from all the data you have all been gathering - there are few such long term data sets. For various reasons it would be great if any of you would be willing to count your route once a month or once every two months for a year. Sally will be doing some of these extra counts herself, but she cannot possibly do as many as she would ideally like to do. So if you have the time and necessary enthusiasm (and funds!) to help with this, we would really appreciate it if you could let us know. Even if you could do a section of your route regularly this would help. A big thank you to George Hattingh, Graham Kletz and all the Humansdorp precinct observers who have indicated that they are willing to count more frequently.
A beautiful day on OV29 in the Overberg, Western Cape Photo: Sally Hofmeyr |
This summer it was a beautiful CAR counting day down here, in the Western Cape, although there was a heat haze towards the end of the longer routes. But many of the northeastern and northwestern Free State routes and some of the Gauteng routes were postponed to the following Saturday, as roads were impassable after heavy rains. There was also rain in Kwa-Zulu Natal just prior to the count, but fortunately the roads were passable on 31st January. The grass was long after good summer rains and there were White Storks on all the routes received from KZN to date, with the highest numbers seen on the two Underberg routes.
A new route was initiated by Ron Blaker in the Middelberg district in the Eastern Cape in January after an unsuccessful recce (locked gate) nearby last year. A route in the Wilderness area (WW01) that was discontinued due to a lack of birds was counted again in January by Alan Collett, who used to count EP07 and has retired to the Wilderness area. Alan suggested that the route be partly re-configured to include more agricultural land and avoid forested areas, this route will be called WW02. Alan also did a long exploratory trip into the area beyond the Swartberg mountains but found it unsuitable for large terrestrial birds.
I received the following report from Duncan and Inés Cooke, who organize the Overberg counts now. "The January CAR Count was conducted on 31JAN2009 in excellent weather. There were reports of generally dry to very dry conditions but tempered by there being many dams well filled and some areas where there was lush pasture. Several routes were affected by the state of roads where wash-aways had occurred after the good early summer rains, making detours necessary. However, the day was a great success and the feedback from the observer teams was that 'a good time was had by all'.
One feature of the records was that Spur-winged Geese appeared to have moved from places where they are traditionally seen to other places where they were unexpectedly present. Doubtless they moved for quality and quantity of grazing and feeding according to the conditions. The dams where water was plentiful had many waterfowl on them.
As for White Storks, they were seen in their thousands, with a count of over 5800. One area between Stormsvlei and Caledon, but on the N2 and therefore not included in the count, had about 500 hundred birds milling about enjoying the caterpillars that were on the lush pasture. In the 2005 year just over 6000 White Storks were recorded, so this year is also a bumper year for them. There were several other reports of the storks feeding on caterpillars in the areas of lush pasture.
In addition to the White Storks there were several sightings of Black Storks, many Denham's Bustards and some Secretarybirds. It was wonderful to see that 56 Cape Vultures were recorded as well as big numbers of Steppe Buzzards. However, the prize incidental sighting must go to the Augur Buzzard recorded by one team.
Now for the prime object of the day, the Blue Crane count. We had an excellent count of 3275 Blue Cranes, but what was interesting was that there were many juveniles and chicks recorded. In fact, one family was noted where two older birds were accompanied by two young birds and two chicks. I feel this represents a most encouraging trend.
A big thanks to all the observers; especially to those who sent in their forms so quickly, it makes the admin so much easier if time pressures don't come into play. However, we would encourage all the observers to re-read the notes on how to complete the form and to comply with the requested procedures, it will make everything this end so very much easier!!"
The river crossing on OV28 has been washed away, so the river is only passable when low! Photo: Frans de Graaff |
Heyné and Sharon Brink saw 10 Black Harriers and one juvenile, on their route through De Hoop Nature Reserve. On OV36 Avril Young saw twenty-two Blue Crane juveniles and 13 chicks altogether, one breeding pair had two older chicks and two small ones. Alongside is photo of a section of OV28 that was washed away when the river was high and now is only passable when the river is low. Frans de Graaff saw six pairs of breeding Blue Cranes on OV33, a route that has previously not had more than two pairs of breeding cranes, and quite often none were counted in the past. I am impressed with Frans's family who always accompany him on these counts, their children are 9 and 7 years old.
The Swartland observers did have to contend with wind and a heat haze that started at about 11. It was also very dry with dams nearly empty. Few nesting birds were recorded. Fiona Hellmann noted far fewer Spur-winged Geese and Black-headed Herons as well as the complete absence of Southern Black Korhaan over the last few counts. Fiona, who travels extensively in the Swartland as a tour guide, also felt these korhaans were scarce throughout the Swartland. I do remember Wicus Leeuwner from the Overberg saying that Spur-winged Geese moult around the summer count time and are therefore often out of sight in reed beds surrounding dams. On SW06 Reg le Roux did record 194 Spur-winged Geese. David and Anne Dixon saw an unusual sight on SW11, a juvenile Black-headed Heron was being attacked by a Peregrine Falcon, that repeatedly hit it on the head till it landed on road exhausted. David and Anne stopped their car close by and fortunately the falcon flew off. On SW13 Angela and Jens Oelbuttel saw one White Stork and a pair of caracal.
Two Blue Cranes with 2 juveniles seen on OV28 Photo: Frans de Graaff |
In the Beaufort West area Stefan Theron who counts WB03 wrote that it was "Warm en baie droog! Soek dringend reen". On WC02 near Van Wyks Dorp Mike and Carol Hewitt saw a caracal walking next to road on their way home. Laurel Bloch noticed that at 11.1 km about 2.5 to 3 ha of renosterveld had been cleared, probably for cropping. Jonas Witbooi, of Kammanasie Nature Reserve and his team of observers counted 159 Blue Crane on WU02. Mike Euston-Brown wrote that on WU05 it was "like counting in an arid semi desert, no wonder there were no White Stork. But where were they?" An advantage of the fact that CAR has spread almost nation wide and everyone counts on one day, is that we do have an idea of where the White Storks were. Read on…
In the Eastern Cape Les and Grant Larter wrote that it was wonderful to see numbers of White Storks in the area this year, they recorded 108. Peter Swift, Ian Field and Alan Thompson, who counted Graham Winch's route, as he was recuperating from an operation, had high numbers of three species, 143 White Storks, 33 Black-headed Herons and 26 Grey Crowned Cranes.
In the Humansdorp area the weather was fine, but there was a bit of heat haze and conditions were very dry due to drought. The usual vleis, ponds and dams were low or empty. Jill Tudhope and her team had their best ever count on EH04, as part of the route lies alongside the Gamtoos Valley where there are several centre pivot irrigation systems. They recorded Blue Crane for the first time in ten years of counting and 114 White Storks. While on EH03 Chris Barratt and his team saw 582 White Storks. On EH05 Yvonne Craig and her assistants counted 196 White Storks. The Denham's Bustard numbers in this precinct were down, probably due to the fact that the areas where they are usually seen had been burnt.
In the Kenton-on-Sea area most dams were empty or almost empty and Bradley Gibbons, who counts near Middleberg, mentioned that there were no chicks counted probably due to the drought. Patrick Brett and Denise Hoffman found the first half of their route (EP01) green and the dams were full, but the second half was much drier.
There had been extensive rains in KwaZulu-Natal the week before the CAR count, fortunately the rain stopped just in time for the count. Drummond and Gloria Densham, who count in the Midlands, wrote that all the streams and rivers were in full flow and wetlands and vleis had high water levels. There were also many White Storks in KwaZulu-Natal! Paul and Bev Garner recorded 282 White Storks on KD02. There were White Storks on all the Midlands routes and over two hundred on each of the two Underberg routes as well. Alan and Bernadine Turner and Devon Scott saw 180 White Storks on KM06.
Stooks Wilton, John Shire and Sandy Sargent saw three Southern Ground Hornbills (2 adults and 1 juvenile) on a farm 6.5 km before the start of their route, KG05. Evelyn Hughes recorded 3 Wattled Cranes on KM05.
Johan de Villiers, who organizes the Newcastle routes, noted that fields of pasture and fallow lands along the Slang River on his route, KN01, that had usually been species rich, were now planted with cash crops resulting in fewer species. Klaus Heyer saw 258 White Storks, 22 Grey Crowned Cranes and 47 Southern Bald Ibises on his route, KN06, where there were flooded wetlands.
In Mpumalanga David Gaynor reported that "All nine routes were counted, but the summer rains again played havoc with the road conditions and MS04 and MS08 had to abort after 15.4 and 26.8 km respectively. Ursula Franke and Hessel Turkstra actually had to be towed out, but I can assure you that the sections counted can still be used. The White Stork count was more than twice the average count for this species over the 12 summer counts completed. Long grass did make viewing while driving very difficult. As David wrote "Once again, the dedication and perseverance of the "Steenkampsbergers", both permanent and visitors, continues to amaze."
The Wits Bird Club teams were able to complete 5 routes. The weather was perfect, but the roads were very slippery. Barbi Forsyth, the Precinct Organiser, wrote that all the volunteers were so delighted with their results and had a really good weekend. Ralph and Daphne Wordon counted a route, they used to count SW06, it was wonderful to see their neat form again!
Tall grass affected counting conditions in the Standerton area and far fewer francolins were seen than usual as a result.
Judy Lynn wrote that CAR was a great success in the Wakkerstroom area, even though they had to split the count, completing one whole area on Saturday and the second area (opposite side of the district) on Tuesday 3rd Feb. They experienced many people being away or ill and thus a shortage of vehicles/drivers/volunteers. "Those teams that counted had a great time with super sightings." In total 1123 White Storks were seen and Amur Falcons in their thousands. Judy Lynn met an Ngogo farmer who advised that he had hundreds of White Storks on his farm and entomologists had done a survey in his area for locusts (the good ones). I will try to find out more about this.
Craig Whittington-Jones, who coordinates the Gauteng routes, wrote that "Despite (or perhaps because of) the heavy rain we have been experiencing we counted record numbers of Northern Black Korhaan, White Stork, Yellow-billed Stork and Southern Bald Ibis and the best summer totals for several other species. In weather that has eventually caused our international airport to be closed our dedicated band of volunteers slipped, clawed and dug their way along muddy tracks throughout the province and I commend their commitment. I am particularly grateful to all those who tried to count on the 31st and on finding their routes impassable, made a plan to return at a later date."
The Karoo Large Terrestrial Bird Survey forms have just arrived, unfortunately fewer than usual. But there were White Storks in the eastern Karoo too! Petrus van der Merwe saw an incredible number of Ludwig's Bustards on his route NK07, 55 in total on all three 20km transects! Ronelle Visagie, who organizes these counts, saw 32 of this species on her first transect NK231. This is most encouraging!
The Free State forms are on their way in the post and some other routes are still outstanding, so please do send in your routes if you have forgotten.
Sally Hofmeyr captured these three Blue Cranes that did a wonderful fly-by on OV29 runs between Riviersonderend and Greyton |
So far much of the emphasis for analysis has been on the crane species through links with the South African Crane Working Group. However, Sally is likely to focus on the bustard and korhaan species. In May 2009 Sally and the Project Coordinator have been invited to the BirdLife SA Bustard/Korhaan workshop, the CAR data will be a useful resource for this workshop. Mark Anderson, who is now Director of BirdLIfe, has been able to get funding for this workshop, I am glad that he is prioritizing these species, many of which are threatened and neglected.
Michael Brookes, the ADU's IT programmer, has made significant progress in developing a user-friendly interface on the web for the queries that Hugues Leray developed in 2007. It will soon be possible to extract trend, density, distribution and habitat information on the CAR webpage, from a summarized database. Just a few problems in producing the summarized database remain to be rectified by René. This process has taken far longer than aniticipated, as the IT staff are struggling to keep up with the many demands of the different projects, particularly the atlas projects.
We are most grateful to the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI) for providing core funding for CAR through the Birds and Environmental Change Partnership. Funding from the Darwin Initiative project 15/002 and from the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund (CEPF) will end this year, as both projects will be completed. The CEPF funding actually comes to and end this month! This is of concern as although other funding applications have been submitted, none have been successful to date and there is very limited time and capacity to source funding.
The Birdlife Border and the Somerset West Bird Club have been incredibly consistent in their support of CAR and again contributed generously to the running of the project. Two past participants have also made donations to the project. The ADU has appreciated continued support from the Tony and Lisette Lewis Foundation South Africa. All CAR observers have continued to give generously of their time and skills, as well as covering the higher fuel costs of these roadcounts twice a year. Funding is still being sought for a Blue Crane genetics research project mentioned before.
The search for funding for the publication of the booklet and poster has continued and we now face a shortfall of R50 000. We are most grateful for funding that we have recently received from the McDowell Trust for this booklet and the assurance of help with the printing costs from Landcare, Department of Agriculture.
This project was extended until April this year and the funding is almost at an end. Recently I have been focusing on communicating the "desirable dozen" measures that can help conserve biodiversity to the farming community in particular. After the presentation I gave at the Department of Agriculture in December last year it was agreed that it would be helpful if I were involved in a Training Day for Extension Officers. Toni Xaba, of Department of Agriculture, is arranging this before the end of April. I spoke to about eighty farmers at the Caledon Landbouvereniging Vergadering (LVV) in February and the CAR leaflets with the recommendations for conserving biodiversity were distributed to all present. In March a presentation was given to about forty farmers at a Darling Landbouvereniging Vergadering. About twenty questionnaires on biodiversity and farming that were used at Agri-Megaweek were distributed and about fifteen were returned completed. Last week I gave my first presentation in Afrikaans to eighteen members of the Koornland Kleinboere (Swellendam) LVV (see photo). Next week I meet with the Breede River Winelands Rotary Club in Robertson and Bird Club members. Details are still to be confirmed regarding the other presentations to the Rooiberg Conservancy and the Riviersonderend and Bredasdorp LVVs. It has proved a difficult and very lengthy process to arrange these presentations.
As far as the booklet is concerned, in February 2009 James completed implementing the comments made on the booklet text obtained from colleagues and the CAR Working Group and wrote the legends for the trend data. James Harrison and I met early in March to finalise the booklet text and discuss completion of the project, as well as CAR priorities. The legend text has been circulated for comment. The booklet text is almost completely translated into Afrikaans! Two long standing participants, Maria Andela and Ann Hiemstra, have been amazing in volunteering to share in this translation and tackled this task with enthusiasm and efficiency. I still need to complete a list of useful contacts and websites for landowners. The Big Birds on Farms project has brought an important focus to the CAR project and increased contact with landowners and awareness of these birds. Hopefully we will be able to source funding to publish the booklet soon so that the "desirable dozen" recommendations for conserving biodiversity can begin to be communicated and put into practice.
This Big Birds on Farms project has taken much of the Project Coordinator's time over the last two years. Also I took much more leave than planned last year due to an unexpected move and losses. There was only time for a very brief discussion with James about priorities for the CAR project as a whole this year. The most important priority seemed to be completion of the Big Birds on Farms project in time and that the booklet be completed and distributed to landowners. A more lengthy discussion with Les Underhill about the work plan for this year confirmed this and the need to catch up with administrative tasks. I concerned that there has not been enough time for general administrative tasks and communication with Precinct Organisers and participants. James suggested that some "catch up" time was necessary before looking at further priorities and it is also important to finalise and submit the almost complete paper for the journal, Ostrich.
I am aware that generally people are far more concerned about their carbon footprint, given the state of the environment and also obviously the cost of petrol makes one think more than twice about getting into one's car. As taking part in CAR does involve travelling long distances I do appreciate this concern, but do want to reassure you that the conservation value of CAR and other monitoring and atlassing projects is considerable. The information collected for the first atlas has been incredibly widely used (see SA Journal of Science article on SABAP2 webpage, click on downloads and legacy article). As far as CAR is concerned the number of data requests has increased considerably and I do send CAR sightings to the Southern Bald Ibis, Southern Ground Hornbill, Black Harrier and Oribi projects, as well as AGRED. Almost all the routes are on GIS so these sightings can be geo-referenced for Environmental Impact Assessments. The crane information is regularly presented at the South African Crane Working Group workshops and in return for some financial support from the Darwin Initiative project we have supplied this project with a copy of the CAR database. Chris van Rooyen, of Endangered Wildlife Trust's Wildlife and Energy Interaction Group, has frequently emphasised that the CAR and CWAC reports are standard references for Environmental Impact Assessments when planning the routing of powerlines. For those of you involved in the atlas projects I have suggested you consider counting a pentad for an hour before starting a CAR route and completing it afterwards, as many routes are nearly circular. Or if most of the route is in one pentad and there are enough people in the car, some could focus on atlasing. Fortunately the slow speed one travels at while counting for CAR does conserve petrol!
Thank you very much for all you help in conserving these magnificent big birds!
Kind regards,
Donella Young (CAR Project Coordinator)
