Lesser Kestrels are in Smithfield reports Lynden Lund

The normally unmarked blue skies are filled with Lesser Kestrels.

They sweep like the strokes of a master artist, collecting and communicating for their evening roost.

A sight to behold, for sure

Eagle Saved From Drowning

by Carmel Rickard

A helper holds the eagle saved from drowning.

Willie Swanepoel and his son Pierre are this month’s birding heroes. When they checked one of their cement dams recently, they found a young Verreauxs’ eagle waterlogged, exhausted and almost drowned.

This eagle, also known as the African Black Eagle or Witkruisarend, is a specialist dassie hunter and a magnificent bird to watch soaring over cliffs and mountain edges where its prey tends to live.

With distinctive patterning on the back and rump (forming the ‘wit kruis’ of its name) it’s unmistakeable. And it’s a large bird by anyone’s standards, with a wingspan of 2.5m.
There’s a pair that we sometimes see flying around Burnet’s Kop on the road to Beersheba and several farmers in the area record seeing birds from time to time.

The Swanepoels rescued the bird and released it when its feathers were dry. Before that though, they brought it round to show me – imagine seeing this creature of the highest sky held like a puppy on my verandah!