Oxpeckers thrive at nature reserve
Researchers to analyse success of nature’s tick-eradication experts introduced into Mountain Zebra National Park eight years ago
Red-billed oxpeckers are ruling the roost in the Mountain Zebra National Park.
Forty of the birds were released into the reserve near Cradock eight years ago as part of a project driven by the park’s Honorary Rangers.
Since then, the oxpecker population has flourished, spreading its tick-eradication expertise far and wide, SANParks spokesperson Fay Ludick said on Monday.
“The current success is measured in the number of juveniles reported, as well as regular reports by farmers of sightings of oxpeckers on their land in the area,” Ludick said.
“Red-billed oxpeckers have recently been spotted by bird watchers and farmers as far afield as the Graaff-Reinet area. It is highly possible these are from the [Mountain Zebra] core group.”
Red-billed oxpeckers feed on ticks and blood-sucking flies and can be spotted on game such as zebra, buffalo and kudu as well as domestic animals like cattle and horses, she said.
“They were exterminated in the Eastern Cape in the early 1900s, largely due to the practice of dipping livestock with toxic chemicals.
“They are highly sensitive to organophosphates – any of several organic compounds containing phosphorus – some of which are used as fertilisers and pesticides.
“Products that contain organophosphates should thus be avoided in areas known to be inhabited by oxpeckers.”
The red-billed oxpecker ranges through Southern Africa into SA with populations occurring in the northern and eastern lowveld and southwest as far as the Eastern Cape.
Besides the reintroduction to the Mountain Zebra park, the birds have also been reintroduced to the Addo Elephant National Park and several private reserves. The Mountain Zebra park birds were introduced from the Kruger National Park.
Now for the first time since the 2010 release, a research programme is being undertaken by the Mountain Zebra Camdeboo Protected Environment – the conservation corridor being developed between the Mountain Zebra and Camdeboo national parks – to study the oxpecker project.
The research programme, launched in partnership with the Endangered Wildlife Trust, will focus on oxpecker monitoring, sightings, awareness and information.
It would also investigate the possibility of reintroducing red-billed oxpeckers on the Graaff-Reinet and Camdeboo side of the conservation corridor, Ludick said.
Dave Smeda, who was chair of the Mountain Zebra park’s Honorary Rangers when the oxpeckers were introduced, said co-operative breeding boxes had been installed for the birds to move into on their release, but they had other ideas.
“They instead chose a chimney in one of the old farmhouses used by one of the staff and there they were quite happy.”
Smeda said the success of the project was thanks to the co-operation of the farmers, who had steered away from the dangerous poisons which he and his team had identified.
There had initially been concern from some farmers that if the birds stripped their livestock of all their ticks they would lose their immunity, but this did not happen because the oxpeckers did not in fact remove all the ticks, he said.
“So they’re doing well and I think we’re all very happy. It has helped to restore the balance of nature.”
For information on oxpecker-friendly products or to report sightings, contact environmental ecologist Maryke Stern on 083-336-3066 or at