Adventure in Eden

A couple of days into the Madagascar adventure now, and we’ve begun to appreciate the struggle between humans trying to survive and pristine nature trying to persist here. Recent conservation efforts have begun to preserve a lot of what was left after human exploitation of this unique island over the last few hundred years, and we hope to see a lot of that in the coming weeks. But for now, the view has been limited to the contrasts within the capital city of Antananarivo.

The view behind our hotel is one of extreme poverty, one room sheds, and crowded, probably unsanitary conditions.

While the view on the other side of the hotel features better looking housing, soccer fields, and lagoons that should have some wildlife (but we haven’t seen it).

Four-lane main roads carry all of the mid-day traffic, which varies from people transporting goods by cart, to bikes, motor scooters, cars, and trucks. Needless to say, traffic snarls make progress on the road extremely slow.

Local commerce with small stands for food, clothing, and other household goods block the sidewalks, so it isn’t really feasible to walk to a particular destination either.

One can get some respite from this scene by visiting some of the nature parks in the city, one of which was close to our hotel (about 2 km, or 1.2 miles) but took 25 minutes to drive there. Tsarasaotra Park is a private nature reserve established in 2001 by a family interested in the preservation of this area. Visitors pay an entrance fee to gain access to the hiking trail.

An island in the middle of the lake has dozens of Snowy Egrets, Squacco Herons, and Black Egrets nestled in the bushes and trees, as well as a huge number of ducks resting on the banks.

Bamboo and Eucalyptus provide nice shade on the walking path around the lake.

The lake is just teeming with ducks spreading out in an even layer over the entire surface of the shoreline.

Impatiens grow here into small shrubs, with thick woody bases.

Pointsettias here are trees! Jacaranda were also in full bloom.

The wildlife seems to tolerate us walking around the perimeter of the lake near them, so we got some good photos of a few of the species.

White-faced Whistling Ducks were very sedentary, mostly standing or sitting near the shoreline. They really do whistle, pretty much non-stop.

By far the most numerous ducks on the lake were the Red-billed Ducks.

About half the size of the Red-billed Ducks were the far less numerous Blue-billed Teal.

Squacco Herons were quite common on the island and we saw a few of them foraging out in patches of water hyacinth in the lake.

A few adult Black-crowned Night Herons sat near the shore of the lake, along with a couple of their juvenile offspring.

One exciting find here was the Malagasy Kingfisher, a brilliant little bird decked out in russet and deep purple.

Since Madagascar has been isolated from Africa, India, and Antarctica for so long, the wildlife that has survived human exploitation of the island is largely endemic, unique to just this place alone in the world. The kingfisher is just one of the many examples of endemic birds and other animals we will be seeing.