Looking for Birds

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Geo: -24.6495, 28.6867

We have spent the past few days in Johannesburg with Paul's parents. For the rest of our leave we were visiting Nylsvley Nature Reserve for two nights and then off to Marakele National Park for two nights. We left early this morning, stopped along the way to buy food and a few other supplies. The whole journey took us a few hours.

Nylsvley Nature Reserve is not a big five game reserve. It consists of the Nyl River Floodplain, which is one of South Africa's largest floodplain system. The floodplain is not always under water. This reserve is well known for its large variety of birds, about 380 different varieties. There are also quite a large variety of mammals, but nothing too dangerous. Here we can either go for game drives or do unguided bush walks, nice to have a choice and not be restricted.

The drive to the campsite from the entrance was only about five minutes. We set up our tent in the very small campsite – there are only 6 sites. After lunch we went for a game drive. We drove to the Jacana Hide. The view from up here was nice. All the grass was dry and there did not seem to be much water around at all. From here we saw four Red Hartebeest, an ostrich and various bird species. We spent a little bit of time here.

We wanted to see more of the reserve, so we drove around the roads. There was a couple of giraffe, more Red Hartebeest, zebra and various birds seen on our drive.

At about 3pm we left the nature reserve and drove around to the other side of it. Here there is another entrance to the nature reserve, but for pedestrians only. We parked our car and entered the gate. On this side of the reserve there are two hides- the Dabchick Hide and the Kingfisher Hide. From these hides we saw waterbuck, roan, common reedbuck and various bird species.

We got back to the campsite at about 5pm and started the fire. It was an enjoyable evening by the fire as we prepared and ate dinner.

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Photos

01 Floodplain
Red Hartebeest that we saw from the Jacana Hide.

02 Ostrich
One of the few ostriches we saw from the Jacana Hide.

03 Bird up Above
A Grey Heron flying over us.

04 Flying
This Osprey seems to want to attack the other species!

05 Ostrich
We also saw this ostrich from the Jacana Hide.

06 Grey Heron
A Grey Heron by the small water pan.

07 Water
The only water that we could see from the hide.

08 Giraffe
A couple of giraffes that we saw as we drove around.

09 Giraffe
More views of the giraffe.

10 Weaver
A White Browed Sparrow Weaver.

11 Scenery
The scenery of the nature reserve.

12 Scenery
The scenery of the nature reserve.

13 Red Hartebeest
They ran as soon as they saw us, which was disappointing.

14 Scenery
The scenery of the nature reserve.

15 Scenery
The scenery of the nature reserve.

16 Nest
This nest belongs to a White Browed Sparrow Weaver.

17 Nest
A close up of the White Browed Sparrow Weaver's nest.

18 Red Hartebeest
Another herd of Red Hartebeest.

19 Birds in a Tree
Various birds in a tree.

20 Poo
A pile of poo - from an antelope species.

21 Close-Up
The pile of poo as seen close-up.