Six Manage a Beach Bimble
Beez Neez now Chy Whella
Big Bear and Pepe Millard
Fri 10 Jan 2020 23:17
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Six Manage a Beach
Bimble
  This morning we all cracked our eyes
open and judging by the ‘empties’ I think this was quite admirable. Larry
announced we were all going for a bimble on the beach and amazingly we were at
the job by just after nine o’clock, not bad when you consider our combined ages
– the livers must all be in superb condition. The six
chaps in the pictures look worse than we do.
 These three at
least ran and skipped a bit.
  The tide was
out so rock pooling. Larry and Marlo carry
bags and we were instructed to pick up any rubbish and look for interesting
‘things’. Big bits would be hung from the frangipani tree in the back garden and
interesting shells to the huge collection on the patio shelves.
  So here we are once more staring at
the Indian Ocean on The Wild
Coast.
   One Man and His Dog. Larry and Zuko with much to explore.
   Clear
water, something catches Bear’s eye and lovely patterns.
  A sad
sight, we think a shark must have done for this
chap.
  A lone
sentinel and lots of giggling from the
group.
  Larry and I were chatting when we saw
a pair of oystercatchers, they always face to windward says I, just as the male began to turn to his wife for life. Ooo they only do
that when they mean ‘business’. By the time I got my camera up it was all over
and she was preening her feathers. Patricia always
known to come out with a pearl said “Why do they do it so quick.” The three men
stayed exceptionally quiet......
A write up we saw later in the Shell
Museum: A threatened endemic. The world population of the African Black
Oystercatcher, is about 5000 birds. They breed in Namibia and South Africa
making them the rarest coastal-breeding bird confined to southern Africa.
Oystercatchers are long lived, many are 25 years old but some have been known to
reach 40 years. They are faithful to their mates and to their home territories
where they must find all their food and a safe nesting site. They are endangered
because of their very low breeding rate and the high mortality of chicks due to
both natural and human disturbance.
Oystercatchers can be seen on
rocky and sandy shores and to a lesser extent in estuaries and lagoons, feeding
in the intertidal zone at low tide during the day and night. They feed mainly on
bivalves, limpets and marine worms. When bivalves, such as mussels, open to
filter feed, oystercatchers jab their laterally flattened bills between the
gaping valves, cutting the strong muscle that hold them
together.
Oystercatchers breed from
November to March. They start laying at the advanced age of 6 – 12 years, with a
clutch of only one or two speckled eggs in a shallow scrape in the sand above
the high-water mark. If a clutch is lost they will sometimes replace it up to
five times. In unprotected area, only 15% of the chicks will survive and
eventually to breed.
Human disturbance accounts for
more than half the deaths of chicks. Eggs and chicks are crushed by vehicles and
people. Eggs and chicks are eaten by dogs. Fledglings are drowned when disturbed
on feeding sites as they hide in the gulleys. Adult birds are
shit.
Natural risks are: Storms that
wash away the nests or cover them with sand. Predators, e.g. genets and fish
eagles. Adult die-off due to red tide poisoning after eating contaminated
mussels. Mass adult morbidity due to avian cholera.
Each pair must produce a
fledgling chick every three years in order to keep the population stable. In
protected areas like De Hoop Nature Reserve the population has slowly increased
from 42 to 70 breeding pairs in 15 years.
In unprotected areas, the chick
production averages less than one per five pairs.
Namibian Nurseries: Many
juveniles fly as far as 2000 km to spend their first two years of life in remote
areas of the Namibian coast. Ringed youngsters from Knysna have been found in
Walvis Bay, Swakopmund and Cape Town. Evidence from ringed birds however,
suggests that they return to breed close to their birthplace. This means that
local numbers are determined more by local breeding success than by influxes of
birds born elsewhere.
  Lovely to watch a
chap soar on the wind and see a regional meeting of
shells.
  I kept seeing lots of dead puffer fish, Marlo told me they caught by fishermen
who simply discard them not bothering to return them to the sea, shame. By the
time we headed back two men from the council were digging a
hole above the water mark to bury the poor seal. Zuko of course checked
out their work.
 Zuko immediately
dug his own hole. Soft, cuddly and those eyes.
  We left the men
to their work and Marlo found another treasure
for her collection. Back home, over coffees, Larry told us our ‘tourist’
choices. The Dias Museum later today and The Cave of Life tomorrow. We readily
agreed.......
ALL IN ALL QUITE A
FEAT........
FRESH AIR GOOD FOR
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