African Wildlife and Environment Issue 65

BIRDING

The vivacious Southern Carmine BEE-EATER

Willie Froneman

There are few birds more beautiful than this bee-eater, which is arguably the most striking in this family group, renowned for its resplendent colours. Its appearance is matched by a vivacious, almost jaunty disposition, so that a sighting of this bird takes one’s breath away.

African bee-eater. It is a long-tailed bright pinkish-red bee-eater with a dark turquoise crown and pale blue vent and rump. The bill of this bird is slender, decurved and black, its iris is reddish brown, lores and ear coverts black, forming a facial mask. The forehead and forecrown is emerald green, with the hind crown, hind neck, mantle and back a rosy red. The chin, throat and

Imagine the sight of several thousand Carmine Bee eaters darting around, bright colours flashing and melodious bell-like calls filling the air. This is the spectacle at any one of their breeding colonies in core breeding areas in southern Africa that occur along major tropical rivers. The Southern Carmine Bee-eater is the largest

Photograph: Albert Froneman

southern region during our winter. The preferred habitat of the Southern Carmine Bee eater is openwoodland and savannas, with a distribution from western Tanzania south to Southern Africa. They breed in a narrow band from southern Angola in the west to Mozambique in the east. In southern Africa they breed in the north eastern regions of Namibia and in the Okavango Delta of Botswana. The flashing colours and melodious calls of large numbers of these flying jewels, create a vibrant scene unrivalled elsewhere in the Okavango’s rich avifauna. They are non-breeding visitors in southern Mozambique, Limpopo Province, Mpumalanga and Swaziland, and vagrants to KwaZulu Natal and the south west Western Cape. Their stronghold is in the Botswana Okavango delta and widespread over most of north and eastern Botswana. They are confined to savanna biomes, open wooded and bushy savannas, dry grassy plains, flood plains, lake shores and swamps with scattered dead trees. For breeding they seek perennial and seasonal rivers, associated with eroded gullies. These gregarious bee-eaters are extremely vocal, perching side by side in vegetation overhanging tropical rivers. They often bathe by briefly splash-diving head first into water, before preening vigorously. They preen, scratch and stretch in between sunbathing bouts. There are frequent disputes

breast are vivid pink. Its upper belly is carmine, with the lower belly and undertail coverts pale blue. The lower back, rump and upper tail coverts are azure. The Bee eater’s upper wings upper wings and scapulars are rosy red, the primaries and secondary’s tipped black, forming a dark trailing edge in flight. The underside of the flight feathers is silvery grey, with underwing coverts pale buff. The long tail is red with elongated blackish central feathers, projecting up to 120 mm beyond the rest of the tail. The undertail is silvery grey with legs and feet pinkish brown. The sexes are alike. The juveniles have a pale blue forecrown with dusky mottling, changing to earth brown on hind neck and upper mantle, with lower mantle rufous. The rump is greenish blue, wings and tail reddish, and streamers short. On the young birds, their scapulars and tertials are light olive brown, and all feathers edged with blue. The throat is pinkish, with the breast pale pink mottled buff. The vent and undertail coverts are pale greyish blue. All immature birds look like adults, but duller. This large African bee-eater is highly gregarious and gathers in large flocks at suitable breeding sites. They are locally common intra-African breeding migrant, arriving in southern Africa during August and September and then departs from March to April back to mid Africa. A few of these birds remain in the northern part of their

Photograph: Albert Froneman

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61 | African Wildlife & Environment | 65 (2017)