I would like to thank John Cantelo from England for taking the time from his busy schedule to draw the new logo for Afropavo. Very kind indeed.

I will again kindly ask our readers who have visited the Democratic Republic of Congo to submit their observations. We am trying to set up a database with all known Congolese records, and this will never be complete without your support.

I am very grateful to Colin Richardson from Australia who submitted his records from the Katanga (ex. Shaba) province. They have proved valuable indeed, as the article from the Katanga province in this issue will prove.

The Lemon-bellied Crombec Sylvietta denti is a wide-ranging species of secondary and primary forest (Urban et al. 1997). Apart from the fact it is a bird of the upper- and mid-strata and sometimes joins mixed feeding parties, few other salient details regarding its biology have been recorded. All accounts indicate it to be uncommon in the eastern D.R.C.., Chapin (1954) only listing Banalia, Aruwimi River and Beni as localities. Prigogine (1971) recorded five specimens from Kamituga, noting it was "assez rare. Presumably acting upon such references the map in Birds of Africa, Vol. 5 indicates denti's range in eastern D.R.C. with only crosses which denotes two "extralimital records" (according to the introductory section on page xii; see map - copyright Urban, Fry & Keith). While admitting the perceived scarcity of the Lemon-bellied Crombec in eastern D.R.C. we believe the BoA map is misleading as it stands, and that a band of red stretching from the Kivu province and W Uganda across the northern Congo Basin would have been more preferable.

In 1994, Marc Languy and Tommy Pedersen saw the Lemon-bellied Crombec on two occasions at Irangi, west of Lake Kivu; One bird at the Orchid's Safari Club on October 31^st, feeding in a tree in the Orchid's Club garden close to the Luhoho River. The bird was alone and watched from a distance of 20-25 m for 2 minutes during mid-morning. The second bird was seen close to the same place on November 1^st , feeding alone in trees by the roadside. It was not shy, and allowed excellent views down to 15-20 m.

The Green Crombec S. virens was more common, with six birds on October 30^th, none on the 31^st and one on November 1^st.

Two records in two days suggest the Lemon-bellied Crombec was fairly common at Orchid's Safari Club.

We suspect that, in the future, the Lemon-bellied Crombec will be found to be more widespread in eastern D.R.C. than currently believed. It is also worthwhile pointing out that although not illustrated in Van Perlo (1995) nor listed by Britton (1980) the Lemon-bellied Crombec has recently been discovered in W Uganda (Fishpool 1993), underlining the ease with which it can be overlooked.

If you have more information on the occurrence of S. denti in eastern D.R.C., please take the time to submit it.

References:

Britton, P. (ed.) 1980. Birds of East Africa. EANHS, Nairobi.

Chapin, J.P. 1954. The birds of the Belgian Congo. Bull. Americ. Mus. Nat. His. 75B

Fishpool, L.D.C. 1993. New bird records from Budongo and Kifu forests,

Uganda with an addition to the East African list. Scopus 17: 37-39.

Prigogine, A. 1971. Les oiseaux de l'itombwe et de son hinterland. Vol. 1.

Ann. Mus. Roy. Afr. Centr. 80, Sci. Zool. 185: 1-298.

Urban, E.K., Fry, C.H. & Keith, G.S. 1997. Birds of Africa. Vol. 5. Academic Press, London.

Van Perlo, B. 1995. Collins Illustrated Checklist Birds of Eastern Africa.

Great Crested Grebe Podiceps cristatus infuscatus
A pair observed near Kamina in the Katanga province on May 9^th 1984. A very interesting observation as this species was previously only known from five records between Lake Kivu and Lake Edward (Schouteden 1968) and one old observation from Inkosakapenda, Haut Luapula in the Katanga province (Schouteden 1971).
Mr. Richardson also observed Great Crested Grebe near Bukavu, S Lake Kivu on October 23^rd 1984. This species was not recorded in the Kivu province during the period 1990 - 1996.

Songa is situated in the middle.

Mongolian Plover Charadrius mongolus
Observed in Kalemie on October 14^th 1984, a town on the western shore of Lake Tanganyika. This is the first record from Lake Tanganyika on the D.R.C. side of the lake. It is an uncommon to rare winter visitor to the Katanda lagoon near Lulimbi research-station on the SE shore of Lake Edward, with one additional observation near Kamituga, SW of Lake Kivu.

ARCOS produces a newsletter called Backbone highlighting many items of interest e.g. a feature on the Itombwe Mtns.

Persons interested in joining ARCOS should contact:

Coordinator, c/o World Conservation Monitoring Centre, 219 Huntingdon Road, Cambridge, CB3 0DL, United Kingdom.

or

The Regional Co-ordination Office, ARCOS, c/o EANHS, PO Box 44486, Nairobi, Kenya