Brown-Headed Parrot (Poicephalus cryptoxanthus)

The Brown-headed Parrot (Poicephalus cryptoxanthus) is a South-eastern African parrot.

I took these shots watching a small flock in Pretoriuskop Restcamp.

IMG_4162 IMG_4171 IMG_4198 IMG_4214 IMG_4215From Wikipedia-close up.

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They are found along the south-eastern coast of Africa from  Kenya through Tanzania, Malawi, Mozambique, Zimbabwe into the northern part of South Africa.  There are 2 subspecies:
P.c. cryptoxanthus: E Kwazulu, E Swaziland and E Transvaal, NE Republic of South Africa, to S Mozambique and SE Zimbabwe.
P.c. tanganyikae: Mozambique, north from Save River and S Malawi to E Tanzania including Zanzibar and Pemba Islands and coastal Kenya

Brown-headed Parrot range

The easiest place to see them would be in Kruger Park, South Africa which is easily accessible to tourists and has a population of around 1500-2000.  You can fly into Johannesburg, hire a car and drive up there in about 6 hours.  I recommend the Punda Maria camp which is beautifully situated in the northern part of Kruger and sometimes has the birds coming into the camp.

2015 Update:  I saw one in flight at Satara Restcamp and lots of them in Pretoriuskop.  If you want to be pretty much guaranteed to see them, go to Pretoriuskop.

IMG_3914a

LEARN MORE ABOUT BROWN-HEADED PARROTS

Wikipedia

World Parrot Trust

Birdlife

Siyabona Africa

VIDEO

This little guy seems to be thirsty but too wary to go take a drink

I can’t embed this video but if you go HERE you can see one feeding in a tree.