176



Bird Life in South Africa.



Durban Bay is very remarkable also for the extreme tameness

of the waders. No guns are allowed. Curlew, Whimbrel, the Lesser

White and Cattle Egrets, Heronsj and many small waders feed quietly

twenty yards or less from the esplanade wall when the tide is low.

I have seen the White-bellied Stork and some kind of large Fish Eagle

over the bay, one of the latter making a practice for some weeks of

roosting on a pole about a hundred yards from shore.


Cape Town has very few birds. The Cape Wagtail (Motacilla

capensis) is common and extraordinarily tame. They will walk about

and feed within a few feet of one, or sit on a wire fence as one passes

within easy reach of a walking-stick .


The English Starling, Spreuw (Spreo hicolor), White-eye

(Zosterops capensis), Cape Robinchat, and Doves are often seen, and

sometimes Glossy Starlings. A common Starling nested in the mouth

of one of the stone lions that guard the Castle gate one season. I am

told the Starlings do a certain amount of damage when the figs and

grapes are ripening, but nobody in the town seems to bother about

them, and there are a good many.


There is a very beautiful race-course in the suburbs of Cape

Town at Kenilworth. Great care is taken to keep the turf in good

condition. This is apparently much appreciated by a Secretary

Bird, which I have several times seen walking round the course, but

not on race days.


During my several journeys to and fro between here and

Pretoria (one thousand miles) and here and Durban (twelve hundred

and fifty miles) I saw very few birds. A good part of both journeys is

over the Karroo, and there I saw only a few Swifts, the White-bellied

Crow, and Ostriches. Where there is water in the upper part of Natal

there are a good many small birds, but on the whole the number of

birds seen from trains here is very small compared to the number seen

from English trains.


The Castle,


Capetown.



