Simon Thomsett

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Nov 09 2007 | By: admin

8th Nov 2007.

The last few days have been unproductive. I saw a comment on the “blog” regarding “What has happened to Duchess?”. I have no idea. There has been no bad news, and I am sure all is well although I remain anxious to make contact. Duchess is very special to me but I cannot expect others to anticipate this and keep me constantly updated. Like a parent dropping off a child at boarding school I fear that I may be seen as overly protective if I pester with queries. Yet I do know things can go badly wrong and very quickly, and things can slip undetected toward a crisis and be misunderstood by those not familiar with eagles. But the fact is that neither the camp or I have good communication right now. I had hoped to drive down and see Duchess, but was unable to do so because I received a new hawk that required constant attention, had promised other commitments and have a lot of urgent extraneous issues to sort out. I admit that in handing over responsibilities to others it has made these chores easier, but at the same time I am worried. But Ol Donyo Laro has the best infrastructure possible and I know that should “anything go wrong” Amos will let me know. If anything does go wrong I will drop everything and go.

On the 6th November a number of juvenile Steppe Eagles were seen feeding on a young Kongoni. It is a particularly interesting time of the year for raptor enthusiasts. Migratory raptors be they from Eurasia or within Africa take advantage of the sudden rainfall to feast on an immediate explosion of “bio-mass”. Steppe Eagles as the name implies, come from the Steppes of Eurasia, as do the Steppe Buzzards.

Juvenile Steppe Eagle 6th Nov 2007

Like all other migrant raptors they usually arrive en masse during rain storms feeding on the concurrent emergence of termite alates (flying ants). Termites are a forgotten food source of incredible bulk and importance. The male and female termites have wings and they fly out of underground tunnels in massive squadrons precisely as the ran falls and often at night. They bash themselves against the light bulb, loose their wings which pop off easily and scamper around the floor grabbing onto the rear end of others like a miniature train set. Off they go to find a hole and set up a new colony….if they do not get eaten. I guess it helps their survival to fly in poor weather and at night. But they pay a price. So heavy is the rain that it is not uncommon to see a flying ant burst in a shower of wings, struck dead centre by a large rain drop and spiral to the ground like downed Sopwith Camels over muddy trenches. As a child (and still as an initiation prank for visitors) I would eat them too. They are turgid with fat abdomens and have a bland nutty flavour. They were once an important food-source for people, but only once did I see someone ever harvesting them. In Embu I saw a large gunny sack held open over a mound, and beneath it was a metal tray with half an inch of water. The elderly man beside it explained that when the winged ants flew up they would hit the sack and then fall back into the tray. I asked him if he could tap the mound to mimic the sound of raindrops and fool the ants into flying. He said he used to be able to do this when others would help, but not now. He’d wait till it rained.

Occasionally some less intellectual colonies would erupt from mounds in broad daylight and fair weather in Kamikaze missions. Waiting outside the holes there may be numerous species of birds and small mammals feasting on them. Once in the Kedong Valley I saw Steppe Eagles, a few Tawny Eagles, one Bateleur, one Martial, one Peregrine, 2 Lanners, a cloud of Eastern Red footed falcons, a cloud of Hobbies, and more than one Eleonora’s Falcon feeding on and over one mound. More surprisingly was the mixed group of hornbills, starlings, Barbets, Kingfishers, sparrows and large Mottled throated Swifts. Nearby a group of baboons were feeding too. It was as if everyone called a truce and friends and foes were at a buffet.

Test for raptor boffins. Not easy. Clue: It is eating flying ants.

Besides termites of which there are many species, there are on grasslands Harvester Ants who go about their life cycle in much the same way. Their flying sexed variety is a tough customer but they too are also consumed in what collectively must be many tons. The rains in our part of the world are brief and life-giving. Dusty dry lands long for rain. There is a dormancy in which plants and animals conserve energy, a period in which it would be foolish to embark on a migration. Our equatorial eastern part of Africa is subjected to the monsoon a notoriously irregular seasonal shift in winds that used to abandon ancient Arabian trading vessels in the doldrums. The accepted notion is that visiting migratory birds, raptors included, embark on their migration as the temperate world gets cooler and less productive at a precise date. As if by good fortune those birds moving in toward our equator from the Northern winter in Eurasia meet what is termed the ’short rains’. On their way back to their breeding grounds they meet the ‘long rains’. These periods of plenty are heaving with life, be it insects, locusts, or small granivorous birds and rodents (which are busily poisoned by man). They gorge themselves with fuel laying down fat for the long arduous journeys ahead. At least that is how the books tell it. The terms “short and long rains” may be incorrect in much of East Africa. In many parts of northern Kenya the short rains bring the highest amount of rainfall. In western Kenya on the edge of Lake Victoria rainfall is pretty much guaranteed all year round, and over-riding all this is the unpredictability of the monsoon and seasonal variation, where rains may never fall at all.

If you watch enough TV you’ll be amazed at how wildebeest give birth at precisely the right time of year for the optimal survival of their young. Just as the rains start and the grasses turn emerald the calves are dropped. So too it is a miracle of timing that winged alate termites hatched and nurtured by workers deep beneath the ground weeks previously mass in unison to the mouths of their holes for an evacuation just as the first rain falls. But you have to wonder if there must be a bit of ‘hit and miss’, where calves are born in drought weeks, and massing alate termites have to turn back in their holes because the rains never came. This year wildebeest calves were being born in January and it extended to May, whereas they should all have been born in February and March. The termites too have had to wait.

This year the rains are late in the Athi/Kapiti plains. Although the first European Bee Eaters were flying high in early September I saw my first migrant raptor, a male Pallid Harrier followed by a Steppe Buzzard in mid October. By late Oct I had seen Montagu’s and a few Eurasian Hobbies only when it threatened rain. By this time migratory small falcons such as Eastern Red Footeds, and Lesser Kestrels were already in large numbers in South Africa, so they had either flown so high over Kenya as to be unseen, or had flown around us.had it rained a few months ago the migratory raptors would have been here for it. Should it rain next month they will also be here for it. The period in which these migratory raptors appear is very broad and entirely at the whim of the weather. This does not make scientists happy, because they want to know precisely when and where migratory raptors move through or appear in Kenya. There is no easy answer.

With so little rain locally and so few raptors seen we may feel that they have “missed the boat”. But I still hold out hope that that should the rains come, Kestrels, and Hobbies, Eagles and Buzzards will arrive to feed almost exclusively on flying ants. To many this sudden arrival (even this late) may be seen as birds arriving from the North, but I suspect they may well be arriving from the south. Raptors are capable of flying back and forth over the continent should conditions suit them.

These Steppe Eagles were feeding on a cheetah kill, just as do our Tawny Eagle or vultures. Scavenging from carnivore kills is an important food source for them and they must be in some way dependent on a regular supply of both wild carnivores and wild ungulates. On the Ethiopian highlands in sub-zero wind-swept plateaus over 12,000ft I have seen Steppe Eagles congregate in impressive numbers. They feed on the incredible abundance of lemming-like rodents that swarm over the land. Here too these unique rodent eco-systems of gargantuan combined bulk could conceivably be one of the critical fuel depots for migratory raptors. But these natural areas are fast vanishing crushed underfoot by livestock and the plough. Steppe Eagles may suffer more than most migratory raptors because their size and weight oblige that they feed not exclusively on small insects.

As terrestrial wildlife declines and the termite producing grasslands/woodlands are impoverished by overgrazing, wood removal and active poisoning of termentia (Termite mounds), the pattern of movement of migratory raptors must be negatively influenced. Rainfall frequency and quantity is declining in Sub-Saharan Africa and global warming is either already with us, or threatens to continue to dry the region. If migratory raptors are an indication of seasonal abundance in bio-mass, then in theory we should be seeing less of them.

This is true. We are seeing far less of them. But instead of prioritising them (as do many international NGOs), it actually highlights the need to focus on those raptors locked within our borders with no hope of a summer retreat in Eurasia. If factors in Africa negatively effect migratory raptors in Eurasia, what of those that do not migrate out of Africa? Surely they are worse off?

With luck the clouds will burst soon, and the sky will be filled with replete raptors.