TANZANIA 2009: A Morning at Tarangire NP

Overnight an elephant had visited the baobab between my tent and Jan’s, and with its tusks had striped the bark. It then proceeded to the swimming pool for a drink, which did not sit too well with the night watchmen, who had to escort it out! A walk around the open compound before breakfast produced Abyssinian White-eyes, Scaly Francolin and Striped Kingfishers around the trees below the patio, a pair of African Scops Owls and Pearl-spotted Owlet (above) that alighted during breakfast on a bare tree on the patio. Needless to say we all ventured out to photograph it.

For the remainder of the morning we worked the tracks along the western edge of the park searching for a Leopard. Though we never did locate a Leopard there were numerous herds of elephants;  a band of Banded Mongoose scurrying over a termite mound; a Steinbok and a lone Buffalo (above) on the run with Yellow-billed Oxpeckers hanging on! It stopped to stare at us. Unhappy that we were there it even made a half-hearted attempt to scare us off.

At a huge baobab with a entrance opening near the base, we were allowed out the vehicle – one of the few places in the park – to go explore inside the natural cavity (above). Mottled Spinetails nest in these dark holes and we found about five of them roosting along with a bat, about 25 feet up.

Magpie Shrikes (above) continued to be a common sight as were Long-tailed Fiscals. The sleek Namaqua Dove could be seen walking the bare earth picking up seeds, and Blue-naped Mousebirds moved from thicket to thicket. In a section of woods we came across Sulphur-breasted Bush-shrike, Black-necked Weaver and Bearded Woodpecker, though the latter was hard to see as we were in the process of negotiating a steep and rough section of track. Yellow-collared Lovebirds, Silverbird, Red-and-yellow Barbet, Buff-crested Bustard, Bare-faced Go-Away Bird and an African Hawk Eagle rounded out our stay in this beautiful park.