African Affinity Birding: The Dry North-West and the Kalahari

After a month in the UK, much as I love an autumn nest full of Blackcaps Chiffs and Whitethroats, I was ready for some African bush birds again. So with Graeme, Graham and Roly, we set off on a different trip to what I normally do, to the west and the Kalahari in the Northern Cape.
We made our way via a couple of really nice bush lodges, and caught a good variety of species, a Klaas's Cuckoo was notable for winter as an afro-tropical migrant, either a very early bird, or one that stayed over?
We were extremely lucky to find a few flowering Jamesbrittenia bergae which were discovered in 2002 only here on this small range of hills!
Heading West, we stayed at a camp near the Botswana border, so dry, the dam at the camp, that we had nets round, was very low and well attended by a few White Rhino, which made net checks interesting!
Lark-like Buntings had arrived, and we caught a few of these nomadic and irruptive birds.
It was so dry we were not seeing many raptors, other than a few Pale-chanting Goshawks of which we caught a few.nWe managed to catch 2 Rufous-cheeked Nightjars in camp, these are an afro-tropical migrant and had clearly arrived already!
At our next camp, we netted at a waterhole for Burchell's Sandgrouse and got several of these cool birds as well as a little Pearl-spotted Owlet one night. There were a few Fawn-coloured Larks singing which responded very well to playback and we caught an individual which was a first for me!
On the way to the Kalahari and our next camp, we were lucky to find a Martial Eagle sitting on a pole at 0800. We got a trap down and the bird was soon on the trap and was caught soon after! It was an adult female at 4.3kg's and a bird Graeme would not forget in a hurry!
After having caught Africa's largest Eagle, we then caught Africa's smallest raptor, a Pygmy Falcon!
We lost quite a bit of netting time to the strong wind that was constantly blowing, so a day in the park was had where we saw lions and a Caracal catching sandgrouse at a waterhole!
On the way back, we stopped off at a big dam to see if we could catch some arriving waders from the palearctic, and whilst there were a few Curlew Sandpipers, Greenshank and Ringed Plover present, there were not enough to take big catches and just caught White-fronted, Kittlitz's and Blacksmith Plovers.