Mabamba Wetland – Best Sites Uganda Birding
Mabamba Wetland –Best Sites Uganda Birding : Mabamba wetland is a prime Uganda birding site famously for the unique Shoe bills the most attractive and sought after bird on Uganda birding safaris. It’s not only a site for shoe bills but a location of various notable bird species and also a nature that attracts to nature lovers. Mabamba wetland or swamp lies west of Entebbe on the northern shore of Lake Victoria on an area covering2424 acres inhabitant with thick marshes of papyrus, water lilies and other types of wetland grasses.
This wetland is a person owned site famously known as Ramsar site and Important Bird Area ‘’IBA’’. The wetland is home to more than 300 bird species including various globally threatened species ,7 of Uganda’s 12 Lake Victoria biome restricted species ‘’Papyrus Gonolek’’ and plenty of wetland specialties. It also harbors flocks of Palearctic migrants annually in every month of October to March.
Mabamba Wetland can be accessed by a several routes. From Kampala or Entebbe, the easiest route passing via the Nakiwogo landing site in Entebbe, approximately 10 minutes’ ferry crossing to kasanje landing, then from there drive about 20 minutes to Mabamba passing through cultivations and to open fields that provides variety of garden birds.
Birding in Mabamba Wetland /Swamp is best encountered from a motorized wooden boat by riding through interesting nature trails cutting through the thick marshes. Above all, the wetland is popular for the shoebill because of its beautiful looks making it the most sought after bird by bird lovers in Uganda. The rare shoebill is also listed on the lite of wildlife of non-birders that are intrigued by its unique looks and massive size. This rare bird can be spotted in few places in Uganda yet Mabamba Swamp is the most outreach and the best site to sightsee the shoebill in Uganda and not only here but entire Africa.
Mabamba wetland is also inhabitant to lung fish which is the favorite food for these rare shoe bill stock. Furthermore, the lung fish is also one of the most sought after fish by the local fishermen and the fishermen have got high chances of spotting a shoebill in their locally catching methods. But away back this fisherman used to hunt and kill them leading to decline in the numbers and almost rendered them extinct in the wetland. Then designating of the wetland a Ramsar site in 2006 provided protection to the to the shoebill. However, birding around the wetland has about some impact to the fishermen and the community. Since birding here is done on boats fishermen do rent out their boats to tourists and make a lot of money. Some fishermen have been trained to work as birding guides around. They also protect the shoebill by not killing them or disturbing, through getting closer to them. There are several shoebill species recorded in Mabamba wetland.
Bird Watching in Mabamba Wetland is best done early morning at 7am beyond that morning hours there can be more fishing activity that cannot allow you to enjoy birding experience.
In otherwise ,Mabamba wetland is haven for birder and one of Uganda’s best birding destination along your birding safari here including ;Long tailed cormorant ,African Fish Eagle ,African Jacana ,African Fire finch ,Black-crowned Night Heron, Black –crowned Waxbill, African Pigmy Goose, African fish Eagle ,Brown Parrot, Great White Pelican ,Grey Woodpecker ,Grey crowned Crane, Gull-billed Tern, Little Egret ,Little stilt ,Black-Crowned Night Heron ,African Marsh Harrier ,Blue Swallow, Blue-Cheeked Bee-eater ,Cattle Egret ,Common Moorhen ,Common Bulbul ,Common Sandpiper, Double Toothed Barbet, Eastern Grey Plantain, Glossy Ibis ,Goliath Heron, Great White Pelican ,Green Cuckoo ,Hadada Ibis ,Long toed Lapwing ,Malachite Kingfisher, Orange Weaver ,Papyrus Gonolek ,Pied Kingfisher ,Marsh Harrier ,Common Sqacco Heron ,Black Crake, Northern Brown throated weather, Orange weaver ,Great white pelican ,Grey parrot ,Pied wagtail ,Pint-tailed Whydah ,Purple Heron ,Red chested Cuckoo ,Redheaded Love bird ,Red –eyed Dove ,Ross Turaco ,Red-shouldered Cuckoo Shrike ,Shining Blue Kingfisher ,Yellow –fronted Tinker bird ,Yellow rumped Tinker bird ,Wood Sandpiper ,Woodland Kingfisher ,Yellow-billed Tinker bird ,Yellow-backed Weaver ,Village Weaver ,Water Thicken ,White-browed Cuckoo, White –faced Whistling Duck ,White-throated Bee-eater ,White –winged Tern ,Speckled Mouse ,Tambourine Dove ,Veilots Black Weaver ,Saddle-billed Stork mentioned but few.
