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Can anyone help me with this bogey bird.
Field guides indicate you can see them anywhere in Kruger, but it seems they are more common in the south. Has anyone come across an area where they are quite reliable. I have searched everywhere with no luck. Maybe there is a certain time of the year they are more common.
They are not scarce so i'm not too sure why I miss them every time.

We usually just see them in the south specially in the Pretoriuskop area and Malelane tar road up to Skukuza.
Saw a lot of them 2 months ago (end August) around Pretoriuskop.
Saw this one during the bad fires on the H1-1

I find these birds extremely shy and are easily overlooked on the sides of the road. It is only when you actively scan the road edge that you realise that you have probably been driving past quite a number of them. I have also seen them quite regularly on the dirt road to Orpen near the Lugmag Dam and that area.

Shelly’s Francolin ( Scleroptila shelleyi )

Other names:
Afrikaans: Laeveldpatrys
French: Francolin de Shelley
German: Shelleyfrankolin
Dutch: Shelley-frankolijn

Could not find much information on the internet about this bird. I did find out that you are only allowed to shoot 8 of these birds per day and the recommended shot size is No 6.

Size
33 cm

Description
Chestnut striped breast and sides, black and white barring on the underside throat is white with black edging necklace. Legs and feet are yellow and a distinct pale stripe over the eye and ear coverts.

Gender differences
Only the male has leg spurs.

Habitat
Grasslands, wooded savanna, stony terrain or among rocky outcrops.

Diet
Corns, bulbs, seeds and grains in winter and insects.

Reproduction
October to January is the mateing season 4 or 5 eggs are cared for by the female only who sits particularly tight the last part of the 20 to 22 days.

Other
It's call sounds like 'I’ll drink YOUR BEER’, repeated 3 or 4 times, usually from a vantage point such as a termite mound or rock.

Gosh, glad I haven't seen then, a call like that might scare the living daylights out of me

Dear Readers,

Here are a couple of pics of a mystery francolin from one of the parks.





It's one of the 4 often confused species one gets in SA. Let's see what readers think it is and then I'll let you all know of a fairly reliable haunt for it in one of our parks.[/img]

Shelley's Francolin

The angle of the pix show the diagnostic feature of Shelly's Francolin all too well - the boldly marked black-and-white belly is the give-away.

I guess the only mystery remaining is that "reliable haunt"

I've only ever heard Shelley's, not been able to get a visual on them yet. So come on out with it Owl. Where am I suppose to go and look for them?

Good work folks - it's easy to confuse these birds with Orange River, Greywing and Redwing if one is nonchalant.

Shelley's is a seldom seen bird in Kruger - definitely heard more regularly. However at Marakele a place where I have found them on several occasions is on the tar road up to the towers in the wooded area just before the final steep ascent that hugs the cliff face.

I tend to find them more often on the descent and that could be due to the element of surprise. Having said that, when I took these pics they were very confiding.

Good luck if you chase them!

Finally saw these beautiful francolins! A group of 8 was showing nicely on the S29 - just north of Lower Sabie. This group hadn't read the manual and wasn't confiding at all.



And to prove there were 8 of them...

Saw one on S65. Very shy. Couldn't get a pic. Did get some video.

Also saw a Shelley's Francolin in April on the S29, west of the H10. A new bird for me too, and that's three reports from the same area S29/S128, so they must like those grasslands. No pic, too busy checking the guide to make sure it really was the right bird.

I saw a group of three Shelley's francolin on 14 October 2008 crossing the H7 in slow motion — it took over 5 minutes for the three to cross the road, and I was trying to block traffic to make sure the birds got safely across No one else seemed to realise that this was an unusual sighting Only one reasonable photo tho, as I had messed up my camera settings