Top 100 Birding Sites of the World

Information

SITE RANK

HABITAT Savanna (cerrado), open grassland, gallery forest, streams and rivers

KEY SPECIES Brazilian Merganser, Brasilia Tapaculo, Cock-tailed and Streamer-tailed Tyrants, Helmeted Manakin, Red-winged Tinamou, Greater Rhea, Red-legged Seriema

TIME OF YEAR All year round

Serra da Canastra National Park’s fast-flowing rivers are one of the last outposts for the critically endangered Brazilian Merganser.

Although Brazil is most famous for its rainforests, there are plenty of other habitats within this vast country that are also important for wildlife. One of these is known as cerrado, which is tropical savanna with grassland and scattered trees. In the last 40 years nearly two-thirds of all Brazil’s cerrado has been modified for agriculture or destroyed for development, and as a habitat it is, if anything, even more threatened than the celebrated rainforests of Brazil’s interior. Not many large patches remain, but one of the best is within the Serra da Canastra National Park, in the state of Minas Gerais.

This large national park, which has an area of 2,000 sq km if you include the nominally protected buffer zone around the outside, consists of two high mountain plateaux with a wide, deep valley in between. It is an area full of rivers and fast running streams, among them the Rio São Francisco, which begins its 2,700-km course to the Atlantic Ocean here. There are dozens of waterfalls and precipitous cliffs, making it one of the most scenic national parks in the country.

The tumbling rivers are home to what, currently, is the Serra da Canastra’s most famous bird, the frighteningly threatened Brazilian Merganser. This marvellous endemic sawbill, with its grey-brown body, bottle-green head and long, wispy occipital crest, has suffered a huge decline in population in the last 30 years, and there are now fewer than 250 individuals in the world. A major conservation initiative has been launched to save the species, but it may already be too late, since not all the reasons for its decline are fully known and the populations are highly fragmented. At one of its last strongholds, this species is usually seen loafing about on rocks or overhanging branches, but it can be exceedingly difficult to track down on the many rivers and streams.

It is easier to locate the specialities of the cerrado itself. The countryside of much of the reserve is strikingly similar to that of the more famous African savannas, with the long grass and scattered trees, so it is no surprise to find South America’s equivalent of the Common Ostrich, the Greater Rhea, wandering around the savanna here. Rheas are smaller than ostriches, with duller, grey-brown plumage, but they still stand 1.5 m tall, making them South America’s largest bird. In winter they often gather into flocks and graze on any leaves, fruits and seeds they can find. Another interesting parallel to the African savanna is the presence of a long-legged, snake-eating predator to take the place of the Secretarybird. In common with its counterpart, the Red-legged Seriema is primarily terrestrial, prowling over the grassland in search of snakes, as well as small mammals, large insects, frogs and young birds, breaking into a run when it has something edible in its sights. Seriemas are more closely related to cranes or bustards than to birds of prey, and often break their predatory mould by eating vegetable matter. They are very wary birds, and are sometimes tamed by locals to keep as lookouts for vulnerable stocks of poultry.

One species that is truly unique to this habitat is a pocket dynamo known as the Cock-tailed Tyrant. A small, upright-perching bird that feeds on insects and forages by launching into the air on sallies, or by hovering, the male has a quite extraordinary display that is one of the highlights of birding the cerrado. Using remarkably fast, insect-like wing-beats, it rises into the air in methodical, helicopter-like flight up to heights of between 5–100 m above ground, all the while raising and lowering its black, bushy tail as far as it will go, and making soft ticking noises. The display is typical of a bird that needs to be noticed in its wide-open habitat, and it certainly works. Cock-tailed Tyrant is among the many cerrado birds whose range is rapidly contracting as the habitat disappears. These delightful and distinctive mites are not threatened yet, but the Serra da Canastra is already one of the very best places to see them.

Another interesting species found here is the Campo Miner, a member of the ovenbird family. In common with the Cock-tailed Tyrant it works hard to get noticed, having a tendency to perch atop the many tall termite mounds that dot the landscape of the cerrado. In display it will also frequently launch into the air, singing and flapping with slow wing-beats, showing off its attractive chestnut-brown wing-bars. As with all the miners, it nests below ground, in this case usually down an armadillo burrow. One of the curious features of its ecology is its preference for recently burned areas. Regular burning is one of the necessities for this landscape, keeping the growth of bushes down and maintaining open spaces. When fires occur the Campo Miners mysteriously appear, apparently from nowhere, and may begin to inspect holes while the ground is still smoking.

Another important habitat within the national park is gallery forest, which grows around the larger rivers and adds greatly to the overall biodiversity of the area. This forest is home to another of the area’s great rarities, the skulking Brasilia Tapaculo. For a Scytalopus tapaculo it is almost daringly colourful, with white on the breast, a bluish wash to the upperparts and a little patch of ochre on the flanks. But it reverts entirely to type when birdwatchers are searching for it, being noisy but more or less impossible to see. Other good species in the forests include the rare Grey-eyed Greenlet, Helmeted Manakin and White-striped Warbler.

It is really the rolling savanna and more open grassland (campo) that defines this magnificent area. Besides birds, the many attractions include the rare Maned Wolf and the Giant Anteater, which patrol the plains in search of rodents and ants respectively. The superb Black-chested Buzzard-Eagle often flies overhead in search of cavies, rabbits and viscachas, and among the many other specialities are Red-winged Tinamou, White-tailed Hawk, Hellmayr’s and Ochre-breasted Pipits and an excellent assortment of finches and hummingbirds. This truly is Neotropical grassland at its very best.

Brazilian Mergansers can be extremely difficult to track down among the rocks and vegetation in their turbulent habitat.

One of the park’s many grassland specialities is South America’s largest bird, the Greater Rhea.