The Birds Were Laughing at Us

Today was a day for the birds. Ndege.  We walked transects about Rhotia (our local village) to identify and count any and all winged creatures flittering about the trees.  We ended our transects at Moyo Hill, which happens to be one of my favorite look outs.  It's a perfect place to look about the countryside, covered in farmland and forests.

Bird watching can be tricky.  One needs to keep binoculars and guidebook handy, and being keen on description is important.  I never realized how many parts of a bird held different names.  Their tale feathers alone are three or four separate parts.  One bird we found particularly interesting, and elusive, was one we named the "laughing bird."  We never could spot it, but we heard it's trill several times.  It sounded more and more like the bird was laughing at our mundane attempts to spot it, hence the name... and, well, a bird already held the name "mocking," so we couldn't very well copy it.