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Those are great pics Nannie,
we saw the storks there as well early June.
Will post my pics soon.

Great sighting and Pic

Seen in Kruger in June this year.
Think it was next to the bridge over the Mlambane River on the H3.

Link

And now for the one we saw this year in Kruger on the H4-1.
their numbers seem to be definitely on the rise.

Large

Large

Have there been any reported/confirmed sightings of Abdim's Storks in the Graaff-Reinet to Nieu-Bethesda area? It is not listed on Camdeboo National Park's Bird List. I am almost positive I saw one (on two occasions) on a Farm to the north of Nieu-Bethesda over the weekend of 11/12 September 2010. Unfortunately not able to take a photograph. The first time it was at a pool of water in an otherwise dry riverbed, in the company of an African Sacred Ibis. They flew off together. The stork was slightly bigger than the Ibis. Its bill and legs looked quite dark; there was no pronounced red colouration. Its back, neck and head (seen from the top) was predominantly black, with white across its lower back, and white belly. The second time it was grazing on its own on agricultural land (lucern field), but flew off before I could get a closer view. I cannot find any information on the distribution or prevelance of Black Storks in our area in order to compare.

Black storks are as good as identical to the normal white ones (Ciconia ciconia), except for the colour. Size and such are the same.
Abdim's is way smaller, so your description of it being slightly larger than an ibis would fit...

Not impossible, we had some openbills in the Cape earlier in the year, and there was a saddlebill in Northern Kgalagadi.

Thanks!

Hey welcome btw!

I agree with the 2 previous postings. However I have seen Black Stork close to that area, probably about 100km away as a stork flies

Here is a photo of 7 of them, flying.



Now that is more than I ever saw in Kruger, in 1 shot! That should get your mind rolling a bit, so lets post a few more while you think:





Got it yet?







Taken today, in The Hague, The Netherlands. These are the same birds as in South Africa, where it is winter now.
For some reason Black storks have been seen all over Holland today, which means excited people all over Holland to.

My first sighting of this lovely bird, near the S100 in April.

13041140412 429 by jansp, on Flickr

Amazing! Almost 11 months since the last post. Which was actually about a sighting 9000 (!) kilometers from KNP.
Are they that rare, overlooked, or underreported?

Great photo Jan!

Thanks, DuQues.
A bit of googling brought up a 2006 article by David Allen, then curator of ornithology at Durban Natural science museum that gave an estimate of 200 pairs in South Africa.

We saw Black storks on the S3 near Kruger Gate early December 2011 and quite a few of them sitting in the river together with Marabou's on the H4-1 in March 2012.

Saw last week halfway between Malelane and Skukuza.