For seven weeks Rich King and I visited Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania and Ethiopia, largely in search of birds.  Rich is a casual bird lister, I try to be a bird photographer.  I hesitate to give either of us these labels because neither of us was ever very proficient at these pursuits and as octogenarians diminishing faculties have further eroded our capacity in these pursuits.  But we keep trying and that is really the goal.  Rich could probably add 500 birds to his life list from this trip except that he has travelled and worked in Africa many times.  Similarly only about one half of the 300 species that I was able to get on the trip are new to my photo collection.  Mostly however we are both happy to observe or capture birds new or not, particularly in a region so different from the northern climate we live in.

In other posts on this site I have and will share some of the experiences that we had.   In this post I will begin to share with you photos of some of the species that I was able to capture representing the breadth of bird life that we encountered.  I utilize taxonomic Orders, Families and Genera to group the species that you are free to ignore if you wish to just appreciate the images. The birds know no borders and so we saw and snapped many of the species in more than one country.

Uganda was where we started our trip and where we had our most complete birding experience, thanks to Mamaland Safari and Tony Byarugaba, an owner and our incredible guide, and so the lion’s share of the birds we got came from there.

To get a better look at photos on my site just touch a photo and it will fill your screen, spool through the gallery and the x to get back.

Acciptiformes

The family of Hawks ,Eagles and Kites, always high interest for me, has some 250 species on all continents except Antarctic, 80 in Africa

Fish Eagles, Snake Eagles, pure eagles, buzzards, and so on represent just a few of the many genera in this family. Of interest is the grouping of old world vultures in this family, but new world vultures have their own family, indicating greater taxonomic differences.

Anseriformes. Bucerotiformes

There are just these two Ground hornbill species. We saw about six of the 62 members of the Hornbill family. The Egyptian Goose was certainly the most frequent member of its family that we saw.

Charadriformes

I captured 26 species in this order that contains many shorebird families. The most interesting for me were the lapwings where I got 7 of the 23.

These two species were often seen together in the same way American Avocet and Black Necked Stilt are in North America.

Some that are within familar families to us and some new.

Doves, Storks and Mousebirds

Three families from different orders. On our trip I was able to photograph 9 of the worlds 353 species of doves-pigeons, 6 of the 20 storks and 2 of the 6 mousebirds.

The storks might be familiar to some but a mousebird?

Coraciiformes

We saw species from three wonderful families in this order. The 117 species of Kingfishers are found on all continents except Antarctica. Sadly in Canada we only have one. On this trip I got seven and chasing them around the world over the years I have found twenty five.

The Bee Eaters are an Old-world and Australia family of 31 species that are wonderful to observe. Like the Kingfishers they often return to their perch facilitating both watchers and photographers, and of course their wonderful colours make them easy to spot. I think all species nest in mud banks so it is a wonder they are always so clean and natty.

The final family for me in this order is the Rollers. Another Old-world family of 13 species, of which I will share only two. Seeing one roll is a treat that I have only seen in Zimbabwe many years ago; capturing it on film is a goal I can only hope for and it might bring me back to Africa again sometime.

And a few More

Cuckoos are a large family that I don’t have much experience with. Like our Cowbirds some species in the family are brood parasitic; meaning that they lay their eggs in other species’ nests.

Some very different birds.

A couple from the more familiar Falcon family

Finally, for this post, I will share two cranes, from the family of 15. They were at the top of my list of birds sought on this trip. The Gray Crowned was great for me as I have many photos from the first three countries. The Black Crowned a bit of a disappointment as I only had one sighting from very far away. The much cropped photo is just good enough to show some of the differences.

I will soon add a few more families…