With no less than 18 endemics almost wholly restricted to it, the Karoo is an essential destination for any birder visiting Southern Africa, as well as a potential source of exciting new species for hardened locals.

Burchell's Courser

Burchell's Courser is seen fairly regularly on the patches of bare, burnished gravel. Burchell's courser is a poorly known and notoriously tricky bird: it may be absent altogether in some years, and even when present requires considerable effort to spot. Double-banded Courser also occurs here. A bird that appears to reach the southern limit of its regular range in the Tankwa Karoo is the Karoo Long-billed Lark, which becomes very much commoner as one enters Bushman Land to the north.

Namaqua Sandgrouse

Perhaps the most conspicuous species along these arid stretches is the Tractrac Chat, a gravel-plains specialist with a short-tailed,dumpy jizz. The commonest bird of the adjacent scrub is usually the Rufous-eared Warbler, a noisy, neurotic and beautifully marked endemic of southern Africa's arid west. Spike-heeled Larks are also particularly common here, as well as Thick-billed, Karoo and Red-capped Larks. Karoo Lark is particularly easy to find in spring, when its rattling call is heard everywhere.

Spike-heeled Lark

Greater Kestrel, a scarce bird further south in the Tankwa, is fairly regularly seen along the P2250, as well as the commoner Pale Chanting Goshawk, rock Kestrel and the occasional Black-breasted Snake Eagle or Martial Eagle. Karoo Eromomela, a curiously localised and sometimes tricky Karoo endemic, is remarkably common along here.

Some Tanqua Karoo specials

T - denotes not normally found closer to Cape Town

The commonest seed eater in the area is usually Yellow Canary; however, nomadic species like Black-headed Canary and Larklike Bunting periodically invade the area. The latter can be particularly abundant at times, and is generally present much more regularly than further south in the Tankwa Karoo. Coveys of Namaqua Sangrouse, another erratic visitor from the south, flush up at intervals from the roadside.

Especially in winter and spring, Ludwig's Bustard may be present in some numbers and are best spotted in flight, while Karoo Korhaans occur all year round. Pairs or small parties are occasionally seen within sight of the road, although their true density is only revealed at dawn, when their atmospheric frog-like duets drift across the scrub.