Birding in Richards Bay
The Zululand Birding Route is proud to be celebrating its 10th year anniversary from 23 – 25 March 2007. The celebrations are to be held at Richards Bay in conjunction with BirdLife South Africa’s 78th Annual General Meeting.
The Zululand Birding Route begun in 1997 as a small volunteer based association which focused on providing information about where to watch birds in the region. It soon became apparent, however, that of the 70 “birding spots” identified along the route there was a very real threat that many of them would not exist in 20 years time, and essentially the “product” would be undermined. There was a need to add direct economic value to birds and their habitats to ensure their long term conservation.
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Birds are beautiful, inspirational and they are also excellent flagships species and vital environmental indicators. By focusing on birds and the sites and habitats on which they depend, BirdLife South Africa is working to improve the quality of life for birds, for other wildlife (biodiversity), and for people. The Zululand Birding Route (ZBR) was one of BirdLife South Africa’s first “Avitourism” products. It laid the foundation for Avitourism developments in South Africa, primarily by its successful ability to engage a wide network of stakeholders from local government to corporate levels. Because of avitourism’s ability to address social, economic and environmental issues it has become a very attractive model that appeals to a broad base of supporters.
Zululand has a spectacular 605 bird species and a wonderful range of destinations where they occur. It is a treasure trove of “specials” such as Green Barbet, Pel’s Fishing Owl, Pink-throated Twinspot, Neergard’s Sunbird and Palmnut Vulture. The ZBR promotes the area and ensures that these jewels of the region are accessible by birders. The ZBR has proved time and time again that tourism can have enormous conservation benefits as well as generating much needed income by local communities and other stakeholders. In this way, birding tourism adds real economic value to the wild birds and the habitats and provides tangible reasons to conserve natural habitats and the birds that occur in them. One of the aims of the ZBR is to create awareness about Important Bird Areas (IBA’s) and bring visitors to them. Some typical examples of these IBA’s include sites like Dlinza and Ongoye Forests, Muzi Pan and Richards Bay’s Southern Sanctuary.
The ZBR is helping create important career paths for black South Africans, by training them up as bird guides. They attend a month-long training course which is followed up by ongoing mentorship which sharpens and assesses their skills to ensure that they are accredited as birding guides. There are currently about 40 guides in the Zululand area, earning an income from their new found skill as bird guides.
BirdLife South Africa Travel works in conjunction with the Zululand Birding Route to formulate customized birding itineraries, incorporating the many facets of the route including the infrastructure such as bird hides and board walks, birder friendly accommodation and guides. More information about the ZBR can be obtained www.zbr.co.za – Tel +27(0)35-7535644 or BirdLife Travel on www.birdlife.org.za – Tel: 082 7777202.
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