One-day Mabamba Wetland and Entebbe Botanical Gardens Birding. Our bird guide will pick you early morning to drive out to Mabamba wetland, an hour’s drive from Entebbe or two from Kampala. At Mabamba landing site you will take a 2–3-hour motorized canoe birding through a maze of channels edged with papyrus and marsh for the Shoebill, Blue-headed Coucal, Lesser Jacana, Papyrus Gonolek and more wetland restricted species. Later after lunch extend your birding through botanical gardens for a healthy checklist of species across diverse habitats in here.
Birding at Mabamba for Shoebill
Mabamba wetland extends some 100km2 from the shallow marshy bay on the northern shores of Lake Victoria. Birding experience takes 2-4hour using a motorized local canoe to access to this expansive wetland’s interior through a maze of papyrus edged water channels. These low-oxygenated waters of this marsh are stocked with mud fish, catfish and several fish species that are favorite delicacy for the Shoebill.
Known as whale head from its shoe-shaped and needle pointed bill, the prehistoric dinosaur like Shoebill stands over 1.2m high. In these marshes it stalks patiently a behavior that has earned it another title Statue hunter due to having to stalk motionless for hours and thereafter strikes with lightning speed to catch its prey.
Species here include L. Victoria biome specialists like Papyrus Gonolek, White-winged Swamp Warbler, Northern Brown-throated Weaver, Lesser Jacana, Blue-headed Coucal, Blue-breasted Bee-eater, Black-crowned Night Heron among others. Swamp Flycatcher, Marsh Tchagra, Straited Heron, Pygmy and Spur-winged Goose, White-faced Whistling Duck, Black Stilt, Reed Cormorant, Papyrus Gonolek, and Purple and Grey Heron, Lesser Reed Warbler, Malachite Kingfisher, Black Crake, Pied Kingfisher, Caruthers’s and Winding Cisticola and many more.
Seasonal congregations include Gull billed Terns, White-winged Black Tern, Whiskered Tern, Ruff, Black-winged Stilt, several Sandpipers species, Little Stint, Yellow Wagtail, Eurasian Marsh Harriers and Osprey. Residents include Grey-headed Gulls, African Marsh Harrier, African Fish Eagle, Palm-nut Vulture all resident raptors. The marsh is the best place to look out for the Blue-Swallow, a migrant from south the equator that occur here from May to September.
The marshy edges and cultivation attract Long-crested Eagle, Scarlet-chested and Marico Sunbirds, Western-Banded Snake Eagle, Lizard Buzzard, Red-eyed Dove, Speckled Mousebird, Black-headed Weaver, African Pied Wagtail, Yellow-fronted Canary, Spectacled Weaver, Hamerkop, Open- billed Stork and many others.
Entebbe Botanical Gardens Highlights
Sitting on the shores of L. Victoria, the century old gardens started off as a research station to test variety of local indigenous and non-indigenous medicinal plants but now works as educational center to botany students and enthusiasts. It’s in these diverse habitats characterized by wetlands, bamboo, tropical rain forests and patches of woodland species here include Orange Weavers on lakeside vegetation, Green Hylia, Great Blue Turaco, White-throated Bee-eater, Grey Parrot, Pink-backed Pelican, Green-headed Sunbird, Common Sandpiper, Straited Heron and occasional Black Egret plus seasonal African and Palearctic migrants.
Other highlights include Yellow-billed Kite, Intermediate and Little Egrets, Purple, Black-headed and Grey Herons, Lizard Buzzard, Shikra, Yellow-throated Leaflove, Red-bellied Paradise Flycatcher, Marico, Scarlet-chested and Red-chested Sunbirds. Grey Parrot, Grey Woodpecker, Crowned, Congo Pied and gigantic Black and White Casqued Hornbills, Ross’s Turaco, African Emerald and Klass’s Cuckoo, Yellow-throated and Yellow-fronted Tinkerbirds and African Thrush make up the list. The tropical rainforest section hosts resident pairs of Wood Owl while African Fish Eagle, Egyptian Goose, Woodland, Malachite and African Pygmy Kingfishers, Black-headed, Little and Slender-billed Weavers, Reed and Great Cormorant, Snow-headed and White-browed Robin Chats occur.
One-day Mabamba and Entebbe Botanical Gardens Birding Included:
- Customized Tour car
- A Bird Guide/Driver
- Bottled drinking water in the Car
- Community Boat Fees and Entry Fees
- Lunch
One-day Mabamba and Entebbe Botanical Gardens Birding Excludes:
- Tips to guides and drivers