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them gathering in the Kapabi swamp
below, while up above the sky darkened with the swirling mass of bats
returning from the night’s feed.
The bats drew airborne predators.
Kites, vultures, African hawk-eagles,
falcons and other raptors took the
opportunity to pluck snacks from
the air. Many bats, we were told,
would also fall from their roost in the
forest and be eaten by opportunistic
leopards, crocs and monitor lizards.
Kasanka, despite its size, is considered to be one of the best bird
watching parks on the continent,
and with the rains came species
we’d never seen. A boat ride up the
Luwomwba River revealed African
pygmy geese, fawn-breasted waxbills, marsh tchagras, coppery-tailed
coucals, blue-mantled crested flycatchers, and Böhm’s bee-eaters…
The list went on and on.
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t began with the bats. Each year, as
the rains start sometime in October, little Kasanka National Park, north of Lusaka, fills with straw-coloured fruit bats,
inbound from the Congo. With its nine
lakes and network of streams, rivers and
grassy **dombos** interspersed between red
mahogany swamp and indigenous forests,
Kasanka is a handsome location for what is –
in terms of sheer numbers – the world’s largest mammal migration.
It’s estimated that by mid-November, some
eight million of these creatures wing their way
here, flying in to feed on the fruit of wild loquat (musuku) and waterberry trees. The bats
roost in a patch of Mushitu forest along the
Musola River. At dusk, we took guided walks
to watch as they set out on their nocturnal
flights. And at dawn we installed ourselves in
a specially built tree hide, 18 metres up in a
sprawling Mululu mahogany, from where we
kept watch for sitatunga. It’s apparently the
best spot in the world from which to observe
these shy antelopes. We counted scores of
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