Snowy Owl (Bubo scandiacus) Photo: Polson, Montana – U.S.A.

Snowy Owls have been popping up all over the lower 48 states this winter, with even one reported in Hawaii for the first time! Here in Montana one of the best places to view these stunning birds is in Polson, an hour north of Missoula. I counted  7 Snowy Owls at once on my last day in Polson, with reports of 8 total in the area. This bird was the last owl I photographed and it ended up being the best photos. I even had the bird all to myself, which is likely why it wasn’t scared by my close presence. There are a lot of people out to see these owls, which is really wonderful for the birding community in Montana and for the Snowy Owls conservation as a whole. There aren’t too many people out there that wouldn’t get excited to see one of these birds in flight on a snowy winter day.

To learn more about Snowy Owls you can visit Cornell’s All About Birds  - Snowy Owl

or

You can visit the Owl Research Institute run by the leading Snowy Owl expert, Denver Holt

Africa Birds & Birding – Uganda’s Bee-eaters – My First Magazine Cover and Article!

I’d like to share with everyone my first magazine cover and article from the current issue of Africa Birds & Birding, an offshoot of Africa Geographic based in South Africa. I’m really pleased that I was able to provide both the photos and the writing for this article and the design team at Africa Birds & Birding did a beautiful job of laying out the article – including range maps. I also have two photos on page two in the advertisement for Birding in Uganda – the Shoebill in flight and the Kibale National Park forestscape. This is my first publication and I’m grateful to the folks at Africa Birds & Birding for taking a chance with a new photographer/writer  - Thank you all!

Please visit Africa Birds & Birding’s website and Facebook pages for more information about the publication and for subscription options:

This article was fun to write since I’d spent the past year in Uganda watching and photographing bee-eaters whenever given the opportunity. Living in Kibale National Park in western Uganda gave me the chance to observe an entire breeding cycle of the Black Bee-eater as well as observing some of the migrant species – European and White-throated Bee-eaters. I always enjoyed being in the forest and hearing a flock of bee-eaters passing over the canopy, alerting me with their distinctly pitched calls.

I wanted to share a few more bee-eater species that I also encountered during my year in Uganda as well as a few more photos of the featured species.

The Northern Carmine Bee-eaters are among the most striking with their vibrant pink hues and the fact that they inhabiting savannas, allowing for superb views. Being an open country species, I was fortunate enough to observe some of their more unique behaviors, such as using Abyssinian Ground Hornbills as ‘beaters’ to kick up insects for the hovering bee-eaters:

Also, I was surprised to see one Northern Carmine Bee-eater cough up a large pellet while perched in the shade. It makes sense since the exoskeleton of insects is made up mostly of chitin and difficult to digest and therefore doesn’t make it past the bird’s crop:

Many birds will take dust-baths to reduce their parasite load in areas that lack water, Carmine Bee-eaters  are no exception:

A few more species of the colorful bee-eaters found in Uganda:

Another photo of the Black Bee-eater for a backwards view of the plumage:

And finally a little quiz, can anyone tell what species of bee-eater these two are?

Forest Night Adder (Causus maculatus) Photos: Kibale National Park, Uganda – Africa

The first time I saw this species of snake was while following research chimpanzees in Kibale National Park in western Uganda. Being around wild chimpanzees in the forest is like having dozens of your own indigenous guides to follow and point out interesting features of the landscape. They don’t miss much in the forest – stopping now and then to sniff the ground or tree for scent left by another animal, or even a fellow chimpanzee. Chimps even veer around hidden snares left for antelope by poachers.

On this particular day the chimps had just hunted a Red Colobus Monkey and all the males were gathered around the carcass eating meat. During and post hunting the arousal level of chimps is extremely elevated – meaning lots of excitement, vocalizing and high chances of group aggression. Suddenly, a ‘Waaa-bark’ pierces the air. This is the call given in alarm by chimpanzees and signals to others in the group there is danger. The call came from the outskirts of the group by a young female sitting 3m high in a small tree. The rest of the chimps froze and looked in her direction. The female was staring intently at the ground and bobbing her head around. The other chimps paused for a moment before going back to the business of eating meat.

Chris, one of the Ugandan field assistants, was near the alarmed female and walked over to investigate. He called out several words in his local Rutooro language to the other field assistants in the area. All I understood was “enjoka,” which I knew to mean ‘snake’ in Rutooro. I quickly left the meat-eating chimps and walked over to see what kind of snake it was. It was a small snake, less than 30cm, bu itt had the shape of a viper or adder – short, but wide body. Not the shape of a snake needing to move quickly to avoid predators. This was the shape of a venomous snake.

The snake didn’t move quickly, but rather froze in the hopes that its cryptic olive-green pattern would conceal it. When I touched the snake with a stick, it took on an entirely different strategy – inflating itself to expose the brightly colored skin between its scales. An action that screams WARNING! to those nearby. I’ve created an animated image of this behavior so you can really see the transformation from camouflage to the warning signal.

This snake was the first I sighted in the forest and I came across this species on 4 other occasions while in the forest – more than any other species I saw. Those photos were taken with a Canon 7D DSLR camera with a Canon 100-400mm lens and an extension tube (which allows for closer focusing).

Side-striped Chameleon (Chamaeleo bitaeniatus) – Kibale National Park, Uganda – Africa

Chameleons are one of my favorite photography subjects for many reasons. Firstly, their overall look is striking with the eyes moving independently and their color changing before your eyes. Secondly, they’re slow moving behavior means photographing them relatively easy compared to some terrestrial lizards that you can barely catch, let alone photograph. Finally, I discovered that you can feed them grasshoppers and they’ll grab them with their tongue right in front of you! It doesn’t get much better than that for wildlife subjects. Also, the variety in size, color and physiology among chameleons ensures a unique experience with each new species found.

Butterfly photos from Kibale National Park, Uganda – Africa

Uganda holds an astonishing 1200+ species of butterflies. Compare this to North America’s 650 species or United Kingdom’s 50 species, and it is clear how impressive a number this is. Of course that is comparing an equatorial region to a temperate seasonal climate with a short breeding season. Kenya contains around 1000 species at comparable latitude.

Butterflies are often a challenge to photograph since they are usually seen flying or can be shy to approach. But over time I’ve been able to capture a few of the species found here in Kibale National Park. At some point I have to sort through and label them all, but up to now it has been fun to see the diversity in color, shape and size. Also, one aspect of butterflies I never realized there is significant variation in pattern and size of males to females of certain species. Now I’m fairly certain I have the bellow species correct with both sexes represented with significantly different color and pattern:

For me, it seems an easy transition into photographing butterflies from birds. The variability and wonderful colors are represented in both and it has been fun here in Kibale National Park with so many species of butterflies to see.

White Rhino Photos – Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, Uganda

On my mother’s first day in Uganda we headed for the Budongo Forest where we’d track chimpanzees among old growth mahogany trees. On rout we passed a sign for the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, which I’d heard of but didn’t know much about. Since there are no wild rhinos, either black or white species, left in Uganda my mom and  figured why not stop and see them. For some reason I thought this was going to more of a zoo experience with the rhinos in little fenced in pens where visitors could view them. It is nothing like that.

The rhinos are essentially wild, foraging in the open bush. They do have rangers with them at all times for protection and the 70 square kilometers has a 3m high electric fence to keep the rhinos from wandering into trouble. The most spectacular thing about this sanctuary is the experience that awaits visitors. Viewing the rhinos takes place on foot, which is such a unique experience in Africa for any wildlife viewing. But the white rhino is the second largest land animal behind the elephant and therefore has a commanding presence when you happen to be on foot nearby.

My mother and I had a spectacular viewing with a female rhino and her 1.5 year-old calf. As if that wasn’t enough, the dominant male came traipsing out of the bush covered in mud after a cooling mud-bath. He was massive and the mud-covered look certainly added to his intimidation factor. Since these animals are with the rangers 24/7 they are very habituated to humans and non-aggressive. It is a spectacular wildlife experience and highly recommended to any who are on rout to Murchison Falls National Park here in Uganda.

Mabamba Swamp Bird Photos – Entebbe, Uganda

On a recent trip to Entebbe to pick my mother up from the airport I stopped at the Mabamba Swamp to try for another shoebill sighting. Mabamba is located across the bay from the Entebbe airport, but to get there is at least an hour from Entebbe on some dusty roads. I had a GPS and figured I’d give it a shot. The GPS map has some point just before the swamp that said ‘Harington’s Shoebill Guiding Service.’ I figured that would be the best place to start. I neared the end of the road and the vast swamp became visible in the distance. As I bumped my way down the heavily potholed road there clearly was nothing resembling a tourist guiding service.

Just before the road ended a man came running out from a mud-hut waving his arms at me to stop. Normally it is not advisable to stop for such people, but since the road was about to end anyways, I figured I’d hear him out. He comes to the window and says, ‘Hello, my name is Harington!’ I started laughing and introduced myself. Later, I showed him the GPS with his name and location inside, his eyes went wide and a big smile crawled across his face.

We did not see any shoebill but there were many other great swamp species to see. Harington said the morning is the best time for the shoebill. I was pleased with the jacanas, kingfishers, and it is always a thrill to be in such a vat papyrus swamp.

Grey-cheeked Mangabey Photos – Kibale National Park Uganda

Some of the perks of working in the canopy is that many other wildlife species will visit a fruiting tree. I’ve been in a single tree with chimps, red colobus monkeys, grey-cheeked mangabey monkeys, red-tailed monkeys, and blue monkeys nearby. I find the grey-cheeked mangabeys to be an interesting monkey with their intense gaze, long cat-like tails and their calls are really fascinating to hear. They are generally very shy, but this particular group is studied and therefore habituated to humans.

African Wood Owl Photos – Kibale National Park, Uganda

There was a woman here surveying for moths at night. This is done by using a bright light to attract the moths and then cataloging the species. The interesting thing was many animals began keying into this bounty of moths attracted to the lights. The baboons would come by in the morning and rip the wings off the big moths and eat the bodies. Crowned hornbills would pluck them off the wall in a flyby. At night the genet cats would come by and eat them off the walls and also the African wood owls would perch in the shadows before silently swooping in for a meal. The owls would be hooting back and forth only a few meters from our open window. It’s a great chorus to witness.

The interesting thing for me is the African wood owl is in the same genus as the North American spotted owl; Strix. There is a clear similarity in the plumage of both the wood owl and the spotted owl but also in their calls. They have a 7-note hooting call and a single rising hoot. Both similar to the spotted owl I worked with in Yosemite National Park in California, USA.

It is certainly a fun bird to see let alone watch it pluck moths from the wall of our house

Fort Portal High-dynamic-range – Uganda

One a recent trip to town I passed an hour by walking around and trying a few High-dynamic-range images on the main roads in town. I’d like to expand on some of these photos and target some of the main features in town. For now, these images give a slice of town life in Fort Portal, Uganda.

Birds of Semliki Game Reserve, Uganda – Africa

The Semliki Game Reserve is located at the south end of Lake Albert in western Uganda. It sits within a large valley walled in by east and west rift escarpments and the northern part of the Ruwenzori Mountains. It is a unique area for birds with many diverse habitats; lakeshore, huge swamps, acacia scrub, savannah, and riverine forest. Civil war, rebel and refugee occupation along with widespread poaching has decimated the Game Reserve’s once abundant mammal species. Once boasted to have the largest lions in all of Africa by one European hunter, now the likelihood of seeing a lion in the Game Reserve is slim to none. For that reason, it is not a major destination on most tourist itineraries.

However, the birds seem to be thriving with my list topping 110 species, the majority of which were seen in camp along the shores of Lake Albert. Storks, egrets, herons, bee-eaters, sunbirds, gonolek, kingfishers and more all zipping through camp to and from their nests. The morning chorus of bird songs was so thrilling. I was up with the sun every morning to watch the dawn foraging parade of colors and beaks flashing through sunlight.

It is a spectacular birding destination and I can’t wait to return.

Tree Pangolin – Kibale National Park, Uganda

10:30pm and there is a not on the door. I get out of bed and I hear David, a PhD student researching golden cats, announcing that he has something to show me. I open the door to find a dinosaur looking creature clawing the concrete at my feet. I’m in awe at this mammal that looks like an armored reptile from long ago. It is a tree pangolin (Phataginus tricuspis). Pagolins are insectivores that evolved from some arboreal mammal over 70 million years ago. No other mammal has more than the 47 tail vertebrae found in the long tail of the tree pangolin.

Pangolin is a Malay (Malaysian) word meaning ‘one that rolls up’ and from the photos you can see how it can roll itself up into a ball, using its tail to wrap the body. Being insectivores, pangolins have no real need for teeth and therefore lost the ability to chew. Their tongue however is the length of the animals head and very sticky to collect various insect species. The tree pangolin mostly eats termites, which they will descend to the ground at night to forage on and use their powerful claws for digging.

Batwa Pygmies of Ntandi Village – Semliki National Park, Uganda – Africa

Uganda is home to a remnant population of pygmies. These are people who’ve traditionally lived as hunter-gatherers along equatorial Africa and Southeast Asia. They are called pygmies because their short stature rarely tops 150cm or just under 5ft. There are various theories that attempt to explain why pygmies are so much smaller than other humans. One idea is that living in the sunlight-deprived jungle inhibits the human skin from producing vitamin D, therefore leading to a calcium deficiency and stunted bone growth. Another theory is that it is advantageous to be small in equatorial rainforest to facilitate more efficient movements; the smaller one is, the easier it is to move through the jungle. It could be a combination of the two, or an entirely different reason for their small size.

Another interesting aspect related to their size is that other mammals living within equatorial rainforests have also evolved smaller than their non-forest dwelling relatives. Elephants, buffalo, duikers (antelope), and even hippopotamus have close forest-dwelling relatives that are considered pygmies due to their decreased size. So there is certainly some environmental evolutionary pressure on these mammals that makes them smaller than their non-forest relatives.

Sadly, the human pygmy’s way of life is fading as commercial logging reaches deeper into the jungle and government relocation programs force them into a sedentary lifestyle; a lifestyle they’re not adapted for. Uganda is home to isolated groups, called the Batwa Pygmies, which historically roamed the vast Ituri Forest of eastern Congo. Today, all the pygmy groups in Uganda have some level of modern influence. Whether through relocation, disease, trade or access to medical care, their culture and way of life will never be the same. It is the age-old reality that occurs when any modern and more technologically advanced society encounters another less developed one. In the case of the pygmies and western civilization, the contrast couldn’t be more defined.

On a recent visit to the Semliki Valley in western Uganda we decided to visit the pygmy village of Ntandi. We had certainly prepared ourselves for the likelihood that this might not be an uplifting experience, but regardless, our interest to learn more about the pygmies fueled our decision. By all accounts it sounded as though we’d enter this village of only pygmies living a mix of traditional customs and those of modern Uganda. The reality was something much different.

We stopped at the Semliki National Park headquarters to get more information and ended up acquiring a ranger to translate and facilitate our experience. There was an expected negotiation for the cost of visiting the village and all parties agreed that it was best to have a local lead the interaction.

We drove into a bustling village at the base of the Ruwenzori Mountains that specialized in exporting cocoa for chocolate. Cocoa beans took up every open spot of ground, laid out on large tarps to dry in the sun. A few turns later and our guide points us down a narrow alleyway, ‘the village is that way.’ I was still expecting us to emerge into some primitive village with makeshift huts where the pygmies lived. This village was no different than any other rural Ugandan hamlet and the people certainly didn’t look shorter than normal.  We parked the vehicle and stepped out into the searing sunlight.

Suddenly, our guide points down the narrow alley and exclaims, ‘there’s one! There’s a pygmy woman.’ We all turned, as if our guide had just pointed out a new animal species and this was some alternative safari. Running up the path was indeed a very small old woman smiling broadly. She quit running just as she reached us and began welcoming our group and pulling us down the alley. This was the welcoming committee and we’d clearly not yet reached the pygmy village.

We strolled past more cocoa desiccating in the hot sun and wound our way through the typical mud and bamboo houses that are common in western Uganda. The pygmy woman was far ahead of us at that point and our group had spread out with some trying to keep pace while others lagged behind to soak up the surroundings. We began to hear voices rising and people shuffling about behind an overgrown fence. We rounded the corner and entered a small courtyard lined with people sitting in the shade on the ground or the veranda of one of the houses. Our guide turned and said, ‘here we are.’

Our guide had informed us that typically we’d experience a traditional pygmy dance then buy some crafts and have the opportunity to photograph as much as we desired, after negotiating a fee of course. Before any of us had a chance to take in our surrounding we were bombarded by pygmy women of all ages shoving various trinkets in our face. These trinkets consisted primarily of hollowed out dried gourds to be used as drinking vessel and golf-ball sized seedpods that rattled with smaller beads inside.  Shortly after growing accustomed to various sizes and shapes of gourds heaving up at your face, we were caught of guard when large knives, spears, and bow and arrow sets began popping up towards our faces.

This went on for about 20 minutes with no room to come up for air. Meanwhile, in the background a group of men were gathering for a display of the traditional song and dance. After paying our fee of $10/person we expected things to settle down a bit and we’d get a chance to see a real cultural experience in their performance. But the women wouldn’t take no for an answer and even when the drumming began and people started forming a circle, most of our group was still caught in the sales net of these determined women. Finally, they broke off and joined the rest of the group in the performance.

The performance was not as we’d expected with a makeshift plastic jerry-can for a drum along side a traditional hide drum, and the dancing was nothing more than stepping in a circle around the drummers. It lasted all of 5 minutes. I have to say that there was copious amounts of marijuana wafting through the air and growing around the houses, which may have hindered some of the more traditional aspects of the pygmy society.

As things began to wind down and even the saleswoman stopped bothering us, I was about to suggest we move on when an older pygmy man took my hand. He began taking me away from the group, saying, ‘come to my home.’ Not wanting to be rude, I agreed and was lead past 3 houses to the last in the row. He entered and beckoned for me in through the exceptionally low doorway. I obliged, still not sure why he wanted to show me his home. There was no light inside and it took my eyes a minute to adjust.

The man was smiling and obviously excited to have me in his home. He pointed to one room and said, ‘wife, sleep,’ then he entered the opposite room and sat down on the bed, ‘I, sleep.’ Then he picked up a spear and proclaimed, ‘take my picture.’ I braced myself against the mud wall since it was near darkness and my shutter speed was sure to be close to 1 second. The man then started thrusting the spear into the air and talking about fighting other men. I couldn’t understand all of it, but I snapped away a few photos. He put the spear down and sat motionless on the bed for one last photo.

I returned to the rest of the white giants and saying little, we left this experience behind.

Marabou Stork Photos, Uganda – Africa

Marabou storks are iconic in any of Uganda’s human settlements. Nesting in tiny trees between Kampala’s busy streets to a remote safari camp’s trash pit; there will no doubt be one of these giants picking through the human refuse. Of course you’ll get pied crows and other smaller sparrows that associate with humans, but the marabou storks are bigger than most children under the age of 15! In all my travels, I’ve never seen such a large bird successfully associate alongside humans. These marabou storks seem to do quite fine here in Uganda’s cities, towns and villages.

In some fishing villages, where there always seems to be excess food waste, the storks and the people walk side by side, picking through the same rubbish pile, inches away from each other. Looking to the sky in any town you’ll find dozens of these massive birds soaring high on a thermal updraft, gaining elevation to survey their domain for the next scrap of meat.

Every town also has a slaughtering site, which attracts marabou storks in huge numbers. Just outside of Kampala on the road west there is a place where fish and other meats are traded and there are always at least 50 storks on the ground and in the air scavenging off scraps of leftover meat.

It wouldn’t be such a sight if the marabou stork didn’t look so intimidating; a thick pointed beak, 1.5m tall with a 2.5m wingspan and up to 10kg, huge hanging waddle, and this ugly bald scabby head. It’s just an all around horrid looking bird. No wonder its nickname is the ‘undertaker bird.’ But it is certainly an unavoidable and powerful sight to see in the air or walking on the ground alongside a person.

African Openbill Photos – Semliki Game Reserve, Uganda – Africa

This is an interesting species because, as the name implies, there is a large opening in its bill, which it uses to extract the meat from snails and bivalves.  The bill is evolved to sever the muscle that holds a snail inside its shell, allowing the bird to shake out the meat for consumption. I didn’t have a chance to see the behavior but I did see one adult flying with a snail in its bill. Next time I’ll try and capture an image of the snail extraction technique. I also captured one of the most bizarre bird poses I’ve ever seen. It was just after a hard rain and the sun came out so lots of birds were in the open trying to dry off before nightfall. I saw this African openbill standing erect with its wings turned upside-down, drying the undersides. It looked like some yoga pose! I captured a blurry image due to the heat waves coming off the ground, but it shows the bird’s pose well.