On our first day out with Aladin we started by visiting the Abuko Nature Reserve about 30 minutes drive from our hotel. Abuko is an area of protected forest established in 1916 when it became The Gambia’s first nature park. It consists of primary gallery forest, which is forest that formed as a corridor along a river. The park has paths through the dense forest along with more open sections, swampy areas and a viewing deck beside the lake.
Near the start of our visit we spent time on the viewing platform above the lake from where we had excellent views of a Violet Turaco, one of the most colourful birds of The Gambia. From the platform we also saw Squacco Heron, Senegal Coucal, African Palm Swift and a Lesser Jacana, which was a lifer for us.
The walk through the dark, dense forest trail was a bit disappointing since it was difficult to draw the birds out into the open to be photographed. We heard a number of excellent birds, such as the Oriole Warbler and the Yellow-bellied Hyliota but these stubbornly stayed in the dense undergrowth and couldn’t be encouraged to emerge. But we did manage to photograph a female Black-headed Paradise Flycatcher and a Snowy-crowned Robin-chat.
We had more success on the open trails, where we photographed Red-billed Firefinch, Lavender Waxbill, more Squacco Herons, African Grey Hornbill and Western Plantain-eater.
We then crossed a very busy road to the Lamin rice fields which gave us a different habitat of open, wet agricultural land. Photography was easy here and we saw our first Hamerkop of the trip, along with Lesser Jacana, Western Reef-heron, Black Heron, Spur-winged Lapwing, Striated Heron and Pied Kingfisher. We also had the pleasure of meeting Aladin’s mother who maintains a smallholding there.
