10,000 Birds

JANUARY 6, 2012

SUPER STARLINGS Tanzania plays host to a wide variety of Starlings, over twenty species in fact. This is the Ruppell’s Long-tailed Starling , a glimmering blue-black bird with a creamy white eye, reminiscent of the Brewers Blackbird but comparatively a little more scarce. It is a showstopper, and for many, a car-stopper.

Tanzania 179

Tanzania Chickens Blackbirds California 179

10,000 Birds

MAY 12, 2013

Definitely my personal favorite of Africa’s pink birds is the delicate Pink-throated Twinspot. Its mostly found on the ground in thickets or the edges of dense vegetation and usually in small family parties. Pink-backed Pelican by Markus Lilje/Rockjumper Birding Tours. There are certainly some stunners involved.

Africa 214

Africa Somalia Pelicans Mozambique 214

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 11, 2011

Tanzania is without a doubt the quintessential African safari nation. Despite being a proud South African, my honest answer is Tanzania. Highly recommended birding and wildlife sites include Selous Game Reserve, the Eastern Arc Mountains, Pemba and Zanzibar Islands and Arusha National Park.

Tanzania 222

Tanzania Africa Stud Leopards 222

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 11, 2012

As visitors’ and the public’s interests expanded from the Big Five, and an appreciation for lesser mammals, birds and smaller wildlife has became more widespread, the term Little Five was coined. Prime destinations for seeing African Elephant in the wild include Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, Kenya, Tanzania, Zimbabwe, Zambia and Uganda.

Buffalo 207

Buffalo Rhinoceros Elephants Leopards 207

10,000 Birds

JULY 21, 2022

The one bird I did not see here, however, was the Bateleur Eagle … One highlight in the area is the Saddle-billed Stork , likely to be the tallest species in the stork family. This bird is represented in an ancient Egyptian hieroglyph. Can’t say that it is a particularly obvious name from seeing the bird.

Ostriches 147

Ostriches Parrots Birds Eggs 147

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 6, 2012

These were the sounds I heard as I walked around a small pond in Amherst, Massachusetts last week, looking for dragonflies, listening for birds. The chapter also spends time discussing classification, explaining how scientific naming works and providing a chart of Frog families and their geographic ranges. These are terms of usage.

Reptiles 187

Reptiles Madagascar Family New York City 187

10,000 Birds

MARCH 13, 2012

“ There is, perhaps, no better place in the world for birds than this country. Despite discovering dozens of bird species, he is however not remembered in any English names of birds. The famous Verreaux family who made several expeditions into the province through the 1820’s and 1830’s procuring specimens for rich collectors.

Mozambique 190

Mozambique South Africa Africa Collecting 190

10,000 Birds

JULY 1, 2014

I enjoy collecting children’s books about birds and nature that I come across in the expected (book stores) and unexpected (academic library conference reports) places. The Taínos named the birds Iguacas, after their call. Spanish settlers arrived in 1493 and called the birds Coterras. The birds thrive.

Puerto Rico 237

Puerto Rico Parrots New York City 2013 237

10,000 Birds

MARCH 2, 2012

When they turn around you get a sense of why they are sometimes referred to as the “undertaker bird.” Add that sense of impending doom to an atypical appearance and you get a bird that stirs strong emotions in people. This bird knew the drill. Suffice it to say these birds provide a great service to the savannah.

Emotional 213

Emotional Collecting Family Birds 213

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 12, 2015

If tourists are too dim to tell Sierra Leone from Botswana or Tanzania, do we really want to rely on them to save Africa’s species? Reasonable people can disagree on the conservation impacts on hunting, on the benefits and costs, and on the morality and wisdom of using it as a conservation tool.

Lions 212

Lions Hunting Sierra Leone Buffalo 212

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 26, 2021

This book is essentially about those birds that breed on the continent south of the Sahara, a topic few birders are familiar with. A few years ago, in the American Birding Association FB group I posted a question: Where would you go if funds weren’t a problem? Some are incredibly rare and hard to find.

Congo 264

Congo Africa South Africa Madagascar 264

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 14, 2012

The wonderful family Meropidae contains 27 dazzling species, of which Africa is endowed with no less than 20 species, the balance occurring across Asia and with one as far afield as Australia. Besides being colorful and energetic, another plus of these lovely birds is that they are relatively easy to track down.

Africa 265

Africa South Africa Gabon Uganda 265

10,000 Birds

MAY 27, 2015

This time it is the Old World that has misnamed a group of birds, or in fact several groups. It all comes back to a split in one of the great bird families, the Turdidae, or thrushes. Once upon a time, when I started birding, this great family included a wide range of species collectively known as the robins and chats.

Mozambique 166

Mozambique Zambia Zimbabwe Namibia 166

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 9, 2012

Weavers are truly magical birds, combining bright plumages with ingenious weaving talents and cheerful, noisy social lives. This blogpost will introduce you to the various genera of birds that are considered to be weavers. Image taken by Markus Lilje/Rockjumper Birding Tours in Cameroon. Image taken by Adam Riley in Ghana.

Tanzania 226

Tanzania Buffalo Kenya Namibia 226

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 6, 2011

Adam Riley, owner and managing director of Rockjumper Birding Tours , is a world birder if ever there was one, but has a special place in his heart for his home continent. Adam will be leading 10,000 Birds readers on an amazing odyssey into Africa starting… now! And Africa is the ONLY continent without an extinct bird to boot!

Papua New Guinea 225

Papua New Guinea Madagascar Africa Equatorial Guinea 225

10,000 Birds

APRIL 10, 2012

Barbets are a group of medium sized, chunky, generally colorful, frugivorous, hole-nesting near-passerines, that are popular targets for anyone birding in the tropics. Originally they were all placed in the family Capitonidae , but over time taxonomists have determined that actual relationships between these barbets are far more complex.

Ethiopia 235

Ethiopia Tanzania Africa Uganda 235