Dullstroom

Dullstroom is a very nice village up in the highlands of Mpumalanga & has become a focal point for nature based tourism in the area, mainly trout fishing; bird watching & various country crafts. It is a beautiful place to be based, with rolling hills & lovely valleys.

The historic Dullstroom Inn, where I stayed.

 The De Berg road.

This is the highveld here, with most of the land being over 2,000 meters above sea level. The climate is cool to cold (in winter) with some localized vegetation & very localized birds being found here. And that is why I am here! 

Blesbok.

Quite common on highveld natural grasslands.

Me, looking for some of the rarest birds

 in Mpumalanga!

Rock Kestrel.

Banded Martin.

Ant-eating Chat.

This entire area is a mixture of natural grasslands, extensive marshes (called vleis here), rocky ridges with Protea bushes & small areas of exotic plantations. There is a wonderful network of small roads & tracks (with hardly any traffic) which give access to some of the best highland birding in the entire country.

I spent most of the day hiking & didn't take my camera (too heavy)! So I haven't got many photos of some of the rarest birds I saw:
Wattled Crane: an adult feeding in a marsh. Brilliant stuff!
Cape Vulture: six feeding on a dead cow.
Lanner: 1
Grey-winged Francolin
African Rail
Eastern Long-billed Lark: 2
Pink-billed Lark: 3
Sentinel Rock Thrush: 2
Buff-streaked Chat:5
Ayre's Cisticola
Pale-crowned Cisticola
Drakensburg Prinia
Yellow-breasted Pipit: 15

Mammals included:
Mountain Reedbuck:1
Grey Rhebok: 1
Yellow Mongoose: 1

Me!

Gurney's Sugarbird.

On the way home, I called in at Lydenburg & found Gurney's Sugarbird!