Weaver news
In the course of his field work (Sep - Dec 2011), he documented an amazing total of 159 Sociable Weaver colonies, and he counted a total of 8119 nest chambers! This is one of largest intensive surveys undertaken on this species. The number of nest chambers per colony at Tswalu are given by these stats: 1 - 52.0 (+- 40.1) - 181 (n=156), which reveal some interesting facets. Three nest masses consisted simply of 1 chamber (VM 2084, VM 2120, VM 2174). The largest colony in this survey contained 181 chambers (VM 2163). A mere three colonies did not have chamber counts: VM 2172 was being raided by a cobra!, VM 2089 was visited at night, and VM 2213 had a Spotted Eagle Owl nest on top, with 2 chicks (chambers not counted to reduce disturbance).
To see all Robert's records see here - browse the tumb-nails to view the variety of nest shapes and sizes; zoom in on the map to see the spatial distribution of colonies. Click on any thumb-nail or map marker to see full details of a particular colony. If there are too many thumb-nails for you, see some of the more interesting colonies under Photo of the Week which lists interesting PHOWN photos with a comment on why it is of interest. To read more about Roberts project see a trip report here. Photo (above): Robert with 3 Pygmy Falcon chicks from Sociable Weaver colony (VM 2104).
PHOWN is supported by Project for the Enhancement of Research Capacity (PERC, UCT) |