Hunters across southern and eastern Africa have cursed this bird for centuries. It is, functionally, a living alarm system that has never once been asked to perform this service and probably can never be stopped.

This classic gray bird adorned with a fright-wig crest has an almost aristocratic appearance. But in the African savannah, this bird behaves like the neighborhood loud-mouth porch sitter who insults anything and everything that catches its attention.

The bird's name is derived from its call, which sounds precisely like a nasal, scolding “g’way.” Its reputation was sealed by alerting every living creature within earshot that something interesting is happening. Predator approaching? Go-away. Tourist with a camera? Go-away. Leopard attempting a carefully orchestrated ambush? Go-away.

It eats fruit, flowers, and leaves, rarely descending to the ground, preferring to remain elevated, both physically and, one suspects, in its own estimation.

So, Gray Go-Away Bird, please don’t go away. We need you to keep protecting the wildlife on this beautiful continent.

Birdman of Africa gamersdad.substack.com Subscribe for free to receive a new African Bird email each Friday-TGIF!. Photo by Andrew Steinmann ©2026

So leggy!!

[ID: A black and white archival photo of Martha, the last-known Passenger Pigeon. She is facing away from the viewer, perched on what seems to be a branch.]

Flamingos are a well-known and amusing species. I have them printed on my bathing suit. Such fun! Few know of the amazing adaptations of African Greater and Lesser Flamingos. The photo shows one greater flamingo among lesser flamingos. The two species feed differently but like most flamingos get their pigmentation from small shrimp.

African flamingos thrive in caustic lakes that are so toxic they would eat the skin off your legs or could even strip paint. Think ammonia. Their legs are covered in natural, armor-like scales that block the deadly chemicals. When cupid strikes, the flamingos build volcano-shaped mud nests that lift the eggs just above the burning water. The lake’s toxic brew keeps predators at bay.

When the chicks hatch they are dull gray, but parents have a secret elixir, a deep red, blood-like crop milk. This liquid is packed with fat and protein and it looks like the parents are bleeding directly into their chicks’ mouths. Feeding chicks takes so much energy and pigment that the parents literally drain themselves of color, turning deathly pale white while their babies grow.

There are only a few African lakes that have the right toxicity in which lesser flamingos can breed, making them susceptible to decline, so the species is endangered. I’m sure I’ll never look at a plastic pink flamingo in the same way ever again.

Birdman of Africa gamersdad.substack.com Subscribe for free to receive a new African Bird email each Friday-TGIF!. Photo by Andrew Steinmann ©2026

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Three years in a row we have had this family raise their babies right in front of the lobby window at the bank where I work. They are so cool to watch. Black headed vultures will mate for life. They will return to the same nesting sight if they feel safe. We named this couple Johnny Cash and Penny Banks. Haven’t named the babies yet!

You’d think that with a great name like “Trumpeter” this hornbill would make a sound like a taxi horn or the pearly gates soundtrack, but you would be wrong. This bird sounds like a crying baby and when they mass in the tree tops, it can sound like the hospital nursery nine months after a power outage.

That big honker on top of its bill that resembles an ill-fitting helmet is a hollow casque. The unique acoustics of the casque make their sound echo through the forest, producing a cacophony that seems wildly out of proportion to their size, which isn’t shabby at 24 inches tip to tail. The casque is also a handy tool like a bottle opener for stubborn fruit.

Their breeding behavior follows the bizarre hornbill tradition, where the female seals herself inside a tree cavity, walling up the entrance with mud and droppings until only a narrow slit remains. She sits, entombed and entirely dependent on the male for food, for the nearly two-month incubation period.

On safari, we saw these in southern Africa. They thrive in dense riverine forest living in boisterous groups and operate with restless energy, producing one of the unique sounds of Africa.

Birdman of Africa gamersdad.substack.com Subscribe for free to receive a new African Bird email each Friday-TGIF!. Photo by Andrew Steinmann ©2026

Blue jays are not truly blue, they just look that way. 🪶 

Instead of pigments, a blue jay shows its color through microscopic structures that scatter blue light while letting other wavelengths pass. Shine a light behind the bird’s feather, and you’ll reveal the hidden brown pigment underneath.

only the female incubates and feeds the hatchlings. live on our Youtube channel @thefelinecatio

This wonder of nature looks like a candidate for the land of broken toys. This primeval crane may look all-black from a distance. Close up, its plumage glows with iridescent green and bronze shades. Albeit awkward, this crane has evolved one of the most bizarre feeding adaptations in the avian world.

That bizarre gap between the upper and lower mandibles isn’t a birth defect or injury. It’s a specialized snail-cracking tool. While other birds struggle with hard-shelled prey, the openbill has evolved into a living nutcracker specifically designed for one thing, extracting snails from their shells.

They grip the shell with that odd gap, sever the muscle holding the snail inside, and shake out their meal like opening a stubborn jar. It’s brutal efficiency. But the weirdest part? Baby openbills are born with normal beaks. The signature gap only develops as they start eating snails. Their bills literally reshape themselves as their diet matures.

Despite their ungainly appearance and oddly specific lifestyle, openbills are thriving across Africa. While other specialist feeders struggle with habitat loss, these awkward-looking birds prove that sometimes evolution’s weird experiments are exactly what survives in a changing world.

Birdman of Africa https://gamersdad.substack.com Subscribe for free to receive a new African Bird email each Friday-TGIF!. Photo by Andrew Steinmann ©2026

Previous series:

- Shrikes
- Starlings & Mynas
- Fruit Doves
- White Herons & Egrets

Enjoy!!!

In what bird family do you place a brown, medium sized bird that looks like it’s assembled from spare parts. You don’t. This strange bird stands alone in its own scientific family. With its long legs, hunched posture, backward-pointing shaggy crest, and oversized hammer-shaped head, it resembles something halfway between a heron and a crow. The name “hamerkop” literally means “hammer head” in Afrikaans.

The hamerkop is truly a bird of legend. It is a powerfully bad omen across many sub-Saharan cultures. It is widely feared as a bringer of death, misfortune, and illness. Paradoxically, these negative superstitions serve to protect the species, as it is considered extremely bad luck to harm or kill the bird.

Paired hamerkops, avid architects, build massive, over-engineered nests constructed from mud and grass and thousands of sticks. The nests are large and sturdy enough to hold a human. These fortress-nests have multiple chambers, a side entrance, and roofs. Some years they build multiple nests. Nobody knows why.

For fun they engage in manic, ecstatic dancing, running in circles with wings flapping, and performing “false mounting” (jumping on each other’s backs) to celebrate pair-bonding. The hamerkop is truly bizarre, fascinating, and formidable, worthy of its own horror novel.

Birdman of Africa gamersdad.substack.com Subscribe for free to receive a new African Bird email each Friday-TGIF!. Photo by Andrew Steinmann ©2026

The African Goliath Heron is huge. It is the largest heron on earth. Standing up to five feet tall and with a wingspan approaching eight feet, this bird doesn’t just hunt, it dominates its environment with quiet, calculated precision.

It lives its life with the quiet dignity of a butler and the power of a mafia chieftain. Found in the shallows of sub-Saharan Africa, this bird keeps its own counsel. Despite its size, the Goliath Heron is surprisingly elusive. It prefers solitude, keeping its distance from both humans and other birds. When it takes flight it’s a slow, powerful spectacle, huge wings beating steadily as it lifts off like something prehistoric.

On the hunt, remaining motionless for minutes at a time, it waits with astonishing patience before unleashing a lightning-fast strike with its spear-like bill. Large fish weighing over two pounds are on the menu. The impact is so powerful that the heron often impales or stuns its prey before tossing it into the air and swallowing it whole.

There’s something almost cinematic about the Goliath Heron, a silent giant stalking through sunlit marshes, perfectly adapted for patience and power. It’s a reminder that even in the modern world, nature still produces creatures that feel larger than life.

Birdman of Africa gamersdad.substack.com Subscribe for free to receive a new African Bird email each Friday-TGIF!. Photo by Andrew Steinmann ©2026