northern black korhaan pair - part 1 - striking high-contrast male

Описание:    • northern black korhaan - part 2 - striking...   male and female pair - on safari at Makgadikgadi Salt Pans

more bustards
   • northern black korhaan - part 1 - speedy h...  
   • northern black korhaan - part 3 - finds a ...  
   • kori bustard searching for food  
   • female buff-crested bustard  
   • kori bustard on the hunt - part 1 - scored...  
   • kori bustard courtship display - part 2 - ...  
   • kori bustard courtship display - part 1 - ...  
   • kori bustard courtship display - part 3 - ...  

The female northern black korhaan is easily recognizable as part of the bustard family - but the male, wow! very interesting coloration - so striking. They are also known for their distinctive aerial displays combined with a loud, harsh call.

"The northern black korhaan (Afrotis afraoides), also known as the white-quilled bustard, is a species of bird in the bustard family, Otididae. It is widely distributed across Southern Africa. Its habitat is primarily open grassland and scrub." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norther...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...

Tips from my trip:
Another frustrating camp experience - in short, don’t stay here. My entire 2023 Botswana trip was built around seeing the habituated meerkats at Natural Selection’s Camp Kalahari on the Makgadikgadi Salt Pans. When I asked for 4 days, my travel agent said, “there’s nothing to do here but the meerkats” and pushed me to stay just 3 days. I still did 4, but she was right - not a lot going for it. I met another travel agent at my next camp and she told me that she never would have booked me at Camp K because “it’s not a good camp” and the better place to go for meerkats is Tswalu Kalahari S.Africa. So that may be a better option than the camps here

Safari time:
Camp K is much farther (1hr) from the meerkats than their other camp = a lot of wasted transit time
even though it’s bright by 0530 they don’t leave until 0630 - which is stupid since it’s so unbearably hot and by 0900 you just want to stop the safari and get somewhere cool. So your safari time is VERY limited.
even though I paid for a private jeep $735/day, they repeatedly pushed their own set itinerary and ignored my wishes

Tents:
were crappy, with a separate zippered bathroom area. Good camps have one enclosed tent, not two connected with 6 zippers to open just to go potty…. Believe me, it only takes one night to know the frustration of all those zippers
only a single, small fan! mine was broken, they eventually fixed it

Food:
got a bad egg on day1, caused severe cramping - had to cut my safari short the first morning
menu was mostly Moroccan-themed, repeated every week and some options were even repeated 2x while I was there, ‘moussaka again?’
manager/cook ignored dietary requests (they got my list, just didn’t bother to read it) - repeatedly served me food I couldn’t eat/didn’t like. Even after I repeatedly mentioned the issue they didn’t address it. I had to ask the manager to sit down and go over the list…only then did she admit she hadn’t read it and failed to pass it on to staff

Guide:
my guide, Kagiso (aka K.G.) - was nice, but he repeatedly dictated how I spent my safari in my private jeep. Prior to my arrival and repeatedly during my trip I reiterated my preferences. He had even mentioned reading my pre-submitted ‘interests’ - so it was odd/frustrating that he would eventually accommodate me, but later forget and push his/his company’s agenda again

But he did hook me up with more time with the meerkats after I asked for more when I found out I was only going to get a short 1-2hr window with them the entire trip (after booking 4 days just for them)

He was good natured and a good guide. He also respected wildlife and my request to only use a redfilter at night (often, they spot with white, then use a redfilter to view, but I prefer not to subject wildlife to night-blinding even for a second. Some guides will argue that you can’t find animals unless you use a white light, but Kagiso found a lot with just the redlight. Twice he located a bat-eared fox family and held the redlight for me to film - so that was a nice and I appreciated him respecting my request. So, if you go, I would recommend him.

But I definitely wouldn’t recommend Camp Kalahari - lots of incompetence and lies, indifference and failure to provide basic services despite their self-described “devotion to providing you, our guests, with the most extraordinary safari experience on the continent.” - not really…not even close. My favorite company is still Kicheche - has the best service, camps, wildlife I’ve experience - these other places don’t even come close.

But if you decide to go, spend the extra money to stay at Jack’s Camp instead - just stay 1-2 days max, check your meerkat box and don’t bother with the private jeep.