ABUKO NATURE RESERVE & LAMIN RICE FIELDS WITH LUNCH AT LAMIN LODGE
What a fantastic day, it would be impractical to mention every great sighting we had and to mention every species would be insane. So a quick precis of where we went and a list of the 'best' species seen plus a lot of photographs is all I can do.
We arrived at Abuko full of great expectations and we were not disappointed. Abuko was The Gambia's first nature reserve and covers some 100+ hectares of primary forest and has been protected since 1978. Over 259 species of birds have been recorded there as well as many mammals, reptiles, insect and amphibians.
As I said in last year's report this nature reserve is growing on me and from our visit today I still support that remark, it was wonderful. We saw many species including a lot of hard to find birds elsewhere on the coast.
The most remarkable was the
Western Bluebill, Snowy Crowned Robin-chat, Little Greenbul, both the
Green & Violet Turacos, Malachite Kingfisher and
Fanti Saw-wing.
After a 4 hour visit we were ready for lunch! The Lamin Lodge is a wooden construction built right on the edge of the mangrove swamps. The elevated restaurant affords great views over the mangroves, rice fields and sections of inlets to the river Gambia. We had a fantastic lunch break, good food, great bird sightings and a lovely cooling breeze.
Our walk along the approach track after lunch produced some great sightings:
Red-necked Falcon, Orange Cheeked Waxbill, Red-billed Quelea, Fine-spotted Woodpecker, Yellow-crowned Gonolek, Double-spurred Francolin, Blue-cheeked Bee-eater, Northern Red-bishop (the males looked fantastic in their breeding plumage),
Variable Sunbird and many more.
At 4pm we drove back to the Lamin Rice Fields and spent the last two hours of the day walking along the raised dirt banks around the rice paddies. What a great time we had and such a lot of species were out there. Both the
African Paradise Flycatcher and
the
Red-bellied Flycatcher were seen together with a hybrid of the two, how cool was that? We had great views of
Hammerkop, African Harrier-Hawk, Grey Kestrel, Shikra, Lizard Buzzard, Striated Heron and the enigmatic
Black heron which showed off its unique 'umbrella' fishing technique.
Our list was not far off 100 species for the day but it was the quality of the birds and the general enjoyment experienced by the group that made it a wonderful 'Gambian Experience'.
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| African Grey Hornbill |
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| Bearded Barbet |
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| Red Colobus monkey |
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| Senegal coucal |
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| Double-spurred Francolin |
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| Fine-spotted Woodpecker |
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| distant views of Yellow-crowned Gonolek |
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| Grey Plantain-Eater |
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| The group at the Darwin centre - Abuko |
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| Hammerkop |
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| African Jacana - (lily trotter) |
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| an obliging Pied Kingfisher |
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| Red-necked falcon |
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| Striated Heron |
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| Senegal Thick-knee |
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| view from the Darwin centre Abuko - a large Crocodile was swimming about in the pool - anyone for a swim??? |
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