This is a voluntary working relationship with the City of Cape Town and the Cape Bird Club since 1974.
A cool to cold afternoon (18 degrees C) with high cloud cover from a passing front. The wind was very light from the SE. There was between 5 to 10mm of rain in the general area yesterday so the ground was still damp. We saw foot prints in the sand, quite deep prints of a male Grysbok by the depth from the weight. Then the front paw prints of a porcupine where a number had been digging in the lower reaches of the seasonal wetlands which is ankle deep in water. We found some porcupine poo nearby, indicating they were active eating in the early morning. The Grysbok midden we found last month is underwater.
Bert carried on in the thicket of copsed Brazilian Pepper trees along side the Keysers River. He estimates at least another 2 months work there. Barry and Robin carried on in an area which has sprouted and grown very quickly since the rains in March (highest rainfall in 24 years at Zandvlei for March month). A Bitou bush which had 1 single flower on it last month was covered in bright yellow flowers this month. I worked along the railway line clearing the copsed shrubs on the PRASA property. Then I joined Barry and Robin, where we found a stand of March Lilies in bloom, a little past their prime growing out through a brush pile of cut down Port Jackson trees. A beautiful sight indeed. Robin found to his alarm a Black Wattle tree, which also had a number of seedlings growing about its base. He collected some flowering invasive samples of a yellow primrose creeper.
The most active and notable insect seen this afternoon were the Cape Autumn Widow butterflies flitting about above the ground and short grasses.
The bird list numbered 13 species seen this afternoon while we were working.
See this link for the past reports of what we have done.
photographs by Gavin Lawson.
Gavin Lawson.
