Barrydale Online

May is the month of ideallic weather, nights not too cold, an autumnal nip in the early morning air, and golden sunlit afternoons.  It is a good month for birding as there is still much singing and calling by the smaller species, and the sunbirds and sugarbirds will be starting to nest soon.

The Tradouw Pass is locally the best birding route at this time of year.  The white  Protea repens  are starting to flower now and are a favoured source of nectar for the Cape Sugarbirds.  One is also bound to encounter the Greater double-collared Sunbird with their broad red chestbands, and the handsome male Orange-breasted Sunbirds, neither of which are commonly seen in the village itself....

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There are a few other non-village visitors to look out for in the Pass.  I have mentioned Victorin’s Warbler before, more easily heard than seen, because it is a skulker in the densest vegetation. More easily spotted (because it may squat on the roadside wall in the afternoon) is the Ground Woodpecker, endemic to South Africa, and one of only three truly terrestrial woodpeckers in the world (the other two reside in South America). Ground Woodpeckers usually occur in family groups of four to six individuals. They eat ants, but do not pick them up from the surface of the ground, rather using their long sticky tongues to probe into sub-surface ant nests, seeking the nutritious larvae that the ants often place under sun-warmed stones during the day.  Because obtaining these delicacies is a serious head-down business, Ground Woodpeckers usually have a sentry posted on an elevated perch to watch out for the approach of any danger.  It is the only woodpecker species in the world known to practice sentinel behaviour.

Another woodpecker species with a distribution limited to the southern and Eastern Cape is the Knysna Woodpecker. It inhabits the forest patches in the gullies along the Pass and is best located by its shriek-like call.

One other forest bird to look out for is the Tambourine Dove.  It occurs along the southern aspect of the Langeberg and it can be heard calling (and sometimes be seen on the road) at the Suurbraak end of the Pass.