Rwanda Part 3: Birding at Nyungwe National Park

 By Richard B. Primack

“The higher the mountain on which you stand, the less change in the prospect from year to year, from age to age. Above a certain height there is no change.” Henry David Thoreau in his Familiar Letters.

Nyungwe National Park has over 300 bird species, many of which are found nowhere else in the world. The richness of the bird fauna is apparently due to the Albertine Rift mountains retaining moist conditions even during drier past ice ages. Bird species were able to survive here over the past hundreds of thousands of years, when they could not elsewhere in Africa.

The main goal of our visit to the park was to see many target species sought after by serious twitchers who need to add new birds to their life lists. To accomplish this task, we hired the highly-regarded bird guide Claver Ntoyinkima. For three days, we traveled throughout the park in search of the target species, hiking the roads and trails and clambering along the canopy walkway. 

Figure 1.  Our birding group on the canopy walkway: Johnny “Birder” Wilson, Duan Biggs, myself, Abe Miller-Rushing, Claver, and Cagan Sekercioglu. 

Figure 2.  Johnny, Claver, and Duan with different birding tools. 

For Abe and me, the secondary goals were to watch the bird-watchers, observe the mountain forest, and evaluate novel aspects of park management. These include significant park entrance fees, requiring visitors to be accompanied by park rangers, the Rwandan government partnering with “African Parks” to manage the site, and numerous soldiers maintaining security due to the proximity to the border. 

Figure 3.  Claver calling in a target bird with a recording.

Figure 4.  Claver sighting a bird with binoculars.

Figure 5.  Claver using a laser to help others locate the bird. 

With Claver’s expert help, we saw most of the target species, including the highly prized red-collared mountain-babbler. Abe and I enjoyed seeing several species of turacos and sunbirds, and four species of monkeys. 

Figure 6.  The park has many monkey species, such as this L’Hoerst monkey. 

For more information on Claver and the Park: LINK