ADU travels, expeditions and events

Doug Harebottle

The Orange River Mouth (ORM) is the first trans-frontier Ramsar site in southern Africa, being shared between Namibia and South Africa. Designated in 1991, the site comprises various wetland habitats including saltmarsh, islands, braided channels and open water. The ORM has been known to regularly support up to 20 000 waterbirds but nowadays this figure rarely exceeds 10 000 individuals. Importantly, it holds 1% of the global populations' of Hartlaub's Gull and Damara Tern and 1% of the southern African populations of several species including Curlew Sandpiper and Caspian Tern.

Counts of waterbirds take place every six months and are included in the Coordinated Waterbird Counts (CWAC) programme coordinated by the ADU. These counts also form part of the African Waterbird Census (AfWC) programme which is coordinated by Wetlands International as part of their International Waterbird Census (IWC) programme. For their commitment and support in conducting waterbird counts at the ORM, the ADU would like to thank Mark Anderson (Northern Cape Nature Conservation Service), Holger Kolberg (Namibian Ministry of Environment & Tourism), John Dini (South African Department of Environmental Affairs & Tourism) and representatives from Alexkor and Namdeb mining companies.

With the generous cooperation of National Airlines, a division of National Airways Corporation (NAC), I was able to fly to Alexander Bay and visit the ORM. The trip also allowed for aerial photographs to be taken of landmark sites such as Langebaan Lagoon and the various estuaries along the west coast.

Photo D.M. Harebottle		Waiting to board the Beechcraft King Air 1900 at Cape Town International airport.
Photo D.M. Harebottle		Capt Adrian Johnson, one of the pilots who would be flying us to Alexander Bay.
Photo D.M. Harebottle		A landscape view of Langebaan Lagoon at low tide.
Photo D.M. Harebottle		A close up view of the southern end of the lagoon showing the saltmarsh area and exposed mudflats.
Photo D.M. Harebottle		Aerial view of Saldanha Bay. Langebaan Lagoon enters the bay from the south (left in this picture).
Photo D.M. Harebottle		A section of the lower Berg River before it enters Velddrif.
Photo D.M. Harebottle		St Helena Bay, with Shell Bay Point and Cape St Martin in the foreground and Groot-Paterenosterpunt in the background. The Berg River drains into the bay at Laaiplek.
Photo D.M. Harebottle		Flying over the Orange River looking eastwards. The Harry Oppenheimer bridge can be seen in the center of the photo. Oranjemund and Alexander Bay lie just to the north and south of the bridge respectively.
Photo D.M. Harebottle		Coming into land at Alexander Bay airport, with a view looking westwards down the Orange River. The bridge can be seen just above centre in the photo.
Photo D.M. Harebottle		Crossing the Orange River just before landing!
Photo D.M. Harebottle		The terminal building at Alexander Bay airport.
Photo D.M. Harebottle		Oxidation ponds from local diamond mining operations are situated within the Ramsar site and sometimes hold large numbers of birds, including African Spoonbill, South African Shelduck and Greater Flamingo.
Photo D.M. Harebottle		ORM information board - creating awareness and providing tourists with valuable information about the importance of the Orange River Mouth as a Ramsar site.
Photo D.M. Harebottle		Heading back to Cape Town. An evening view over Namaqualand soon after take-off from Alexander Bay airport.

I would like to thank National Airways Corporation and National Airlines for their cooperation and hospitatlity provided to me during this trip. Thanks are also due to Captian Adrian Johnson for driving me around the ORM and for enduring a birder for nearly three hours!