April 1998 
11 
easily be seen. After a few minutes the bird 
flew to the base of a palm tree, Hyphaene 
ventricosa , where it foraged among the 
litter. Moments later it was joined by a 
second individual. I watched the two birds 
for approximately 5 minutes with 8 x 42 
binoculars. During that time they mostly 
foraged on the ground but occasionally flew 
up into a palm where there was at least one 
other Collared Palm Thrush. 
The area where the Collared Palm 
Thrushes were seen is named Mahali Pa 
Nyati. It is open grassland, adjacent to the 
ground-water forest, with groves of palm 
trees and wild mango Tabernaemontana 
usambarensis, very similar to the Collared 
Palm Thrush’s normal habitat. 
Collared Palm Thrush normally occurs 
along the Kenya/Tanzania coast, 
approximately 400 km from Manyara 
(Britton 1980, Keith etal. 1992). The nearest 
location to Manyara where they are recorded 
appears to be Mwanza, 320 km to the west, 
on Lake Victoria. The nearest location to 
the south is Ruhaha National Park, 
L. 
C^Jcrw^bo ? 9 S' 
approximately 400 km away. 
Records from the Tanzania bird atlas database (N. E. 
Baker, pers . comm.) reveal that there is a record from 
the south of Lake Manyara by Zul Bhatia in December 
1995. Shortly after 1 made my observation, the species 
was recorded on the north shore of Lake Eyasi by Willem 
Defloor in late October 1997, and on 28 November 1997 
by Dave Peterson at the south of Lake Manyara. It 
appears that either this bird is a very scarce (and 
therefore rarely reported) resident in the Manyara area, 
or (as the cluster of 1997 records might suggest) an 
occasional seasonal visitor. 
Acknowledgements 
Many thanks to Neil Baker and the Tanzania Bird Atlas 
Project for information on Collared Palm Thrush 
sightings. 
Dave Richards, P. 0, Box 24545, Nairobi, Kenya 
References 
Britton, P.L. (ed) 1980. The birds of East Africa. Nairobi: 
EANHS. 
Keith, S., Urban, E.K, & Fry, C.H. 1992. The birds of 
Africa , Vol4. London: Academic Press. 
A NOTE ON THE FLAMINGOS IN KYAMBURA 
WILDLIFE RESERVE, UGANDA 
Kyambura Wildlife (formerly Game) Reserve in south¬ 
western Uganda is bordered to the north by the Kazmga 
Channel and Lake George and to the west by Queen 
Elizabeth National Park (QENP). Between April and 
September 1994, Frontier Uganda, a collaborative 
project between the Society for Environmental 
Exploration and the Uganda Wildlife Authority, carried 
out a 20-week baseline survey in the Reserve. 
Time and man-power accorded to the ornithological 
component of this survey were limited and much of the 
work carried out was opportunistic, but one interesting 
finding was the number of Lesser Flamingo 
Phoeniconaias minor and Greater Flamingo 
Phoenicopterus (ruber) roseus that were present 
throughout the survey period. Although both species of 
flamingo are regularly recorded in Kyambura and QENP, 
their numbers are limited and they are generally 
migratory. 
There are three saline lakes within Kyambura Game 
Reserve (see map) and flamingos were found on all 
three. Two of the lakes, Bugisha and Maseche, are close 
to the northern border of the Reserve whilst Nshenyi is 
7 km further south. During the survey period the water 
level on Nshenyi remained fairly constant, but Bugisha 
and Maseche dropped considerably during the dry season 
(June-August), although neither lake dried up completely. 
According to the resident Game Assistant, 
Constantine Abagaba, who has worked in Kyambura since 
1984, and the concession manager Louis Nortje, 1994 
was the first year in which the flamingos had stayed in 
Kyambura past January. Although numbers fluctuated, 
flamingos were recorded throughout the entire survey 
period. 
Throughout the survey Lesser Flamingos were 
estimated to form around 95% of the total flamingo 
population, with the largest single combined count being 
over 9,000 during June on the southern lake, Nshenyi 
This makes it a site of national importance (D. Fbmerc*. 
pers. comm.). The count also shows a marked increase 
