Madagascar Birding Tours
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Birding Madagascar, our world’s fourth-largest island, is quite simply, unique. Six bird families and five mammal families (including the lemurs) are endemic to this massive island, and half the world’s chameleons, weird and wonderful endemic plant families, and tons of other wildlife can be found here. An astonishing 120 bird species are endemic (including such exotic groups as vangas, ground rollers, cuckoo roller, couas, asities, and mesites). Lemurs vie for attention, from the tiny mouse lemurs to the marvelous sifakas and the amazing indri with its calls that resound through the forest. Our tours visit a range of habitats: grasslands, dry deciduous woodland, the bizarre spiny forest with its odd octopus trees (Didiera madagascariensis) and elephant’s foot trees (Pachypodium rosulatum), lush eastern rainforest, as well as lagoons and mudflats.
The birds that we’ll look for include the roadrunner-like Long-tailed Ground Roller and the stunning Pitta-like, Scaly, and Rufous-headed Ground Rollers, as well as the highly-prized Subdesert Mesite, the unforgettable Giant Coua, the astounding Velvet Asity, and Madagascan Ibis, to name just a handful. We invite you to join us on a special birding and wildlife tour to experience the fauna and flora of this amazing, vast island! We’re sure to also do night walks for the nocturnal lemurs, birds, Giraffe-necked Weevil and other non-diurnal wonders.
Some of the many sites we visit during our Madagascar bird watching trips are Perinet Special Reserve and the wider Andasibe-Mantadia National Park (where Indri and Black-and-white Ruffed Lemur often steal the show, even though this is also a great place to see four of the ground rollers, Nuthatch Vanga, Blue Vanga, Madagascan Flufftail and other beautiful birds), Nosy Ve for its Crab-plovers, tropicbirds and Littoral Rock Thrush, Ranomafana National Park, Lake Aloatra, Ankarafantsika and Berenty Reserve, among many other superb sites.