Obudu Plateau and Becheve: montane forest song of the Cameroon highlands
Bannerman's weaver, Cameroon montane greenbul, green-breasted bushshrike (rare), mountain robin-chat, white-throated mountain babbler, Preuss's guenon in the forest patches. Obudu Plateau and Becheve Nature Reserve, Cross River State, Nigeria.
Best time: 1 Dec – 28 Feb (December to February). Where: Becheve Nature Reserve, Obudu Mountain Resort (Obudu Cattle Ranch) (Nigeria). Time of day: From first light to about 09:00, before the cloud rolls up from the lowlands.
- Partly on your own
- Low cost
- Binoculars helpful
- Sound 4/5
Open it in the interactive calendarSunrise and sunset listening times for the day you pick, and the map.
When is the best time?
Peak: 1 Dec – 28 Feb. December to February: clear mornings before the mist; Bannerman's weaver breeds mainly Aug–Oct but is resident and singing on the forest edges
Active from 1 Nov to 30 Apr (November to April) in a typical year.
Time of day
From first light to about 09:00, before the cloud rolls up from the lowlands; song again in the late afternoon when the mist clears
- Dawn chorus: first light → 09:00
- Afternoon song: 16:00 → sunset
What will you hear?
A cool, high-altitude chorus at 1,600 m — montane greenbuls, robin-chats and babblers from the forest patches, weavers on the edges — with cattle bells on the grassland and, on clear mornings, almost nothing else.
Binoculars?
Binoculars helpful. Montane birds in small forest patches at close range; binoculars help with greenbuls and weavers in the mist.
Where to go
- Becheve Nature Reserve — Community forest patch on the plateau adjoining the Obudu Mountain Resort; the reliable site for the endemics. Map
- Obudu Mountain Resort (Obudu Cattle Ranch) — Base at 1,600 m with the cable car and a network of tracks; forest patches along the ridge roads. Map
How to go on your own, and what it costs
Bus or shared taxi from Calabar/Ikom to Obudu town, then the resort road up the escarpment (taxi); the plateau tracks and the resort grounds are walkable without a guide. Becheve reserve asks for a community fee and a local guide.
Cost: Plateau tracks free; Becheve community fee, check current prices; resort accommodation is the main cost.
Free or no-guide alternative: The ridge road and the plateau tracks outside Becheve are free and pass forest patches with most of the same species at dawn.
Field-recording notes
The plateau is grazing land and resort tracks — open, walkable and free; Becheve is a community reserve with a small fee and a local guide. Cloud and drizzle can arrive by mid-morning even in the dry season; the temperature drops to single figures at night, so condensation is worse than in the lowlands. The resort generator and the road up the escarpment are the only noise. Cross River State: check current travel advice.
Sources
Similar spectacles
Tiwai Island — eleven primates and the Moa river dawnOne of the densest primate soundscapes in Africa: Diana monkeys' explosive alarm calls, red colobus chatter, the roar of king colobus, chimps' pant-hoots across the river, hornbills whooshing overhead, and the Moa river's rapids underneath.
Sapo National Park — pygmy hippo, elephants and the deepest forest in West AfricaPrimary Upper Guinea rainforest with nothing man-made within a day's walk: casqued hornbills, chimps, Diana monkeys, the whistles of duikers, elephants rumbling at night, tree hyrax, and the full insect and frog layer of a forest that has never been logged.
Upper Guinea rainforest dawn chorus — Kakum & AnkasaGreat blue turacos bubbling from the emergents, the far-carrying wailing of white-crested hornbills, yellow-casqued hornbills' whooshing wingbeats, chattering monkeys, cicadas switching on with the light and the screaming of tree hyrax at night.
Korup: drills, red colobus and the oldest rainforest dawn in AfricaDrill and mangabey troops crashing and grunting through the understorey, red colobus shrieks, chimpanzee pant-hoots at a distance, hornbills, the buzz of cicadas at first light and, from the Rengo camp, a night of tree hyrax and frogs over the Mana river.
Monte Alén: the Río Muni rainforest dawn, elephants and the goliath frog riversA Central African lowland chorus: hornbills whooshing overhead, the bubbling of greenbuls and the far pant-hoots of chimpanzees, mandrill grunts, elephant rumbles at the swamp edge. The goliath frog itself is nearly silent (no vocal sac) — its rivers are a night of other frogs and the roar of water over rock.
Obô forest dawn: São Tomé's endemic birds above Bom SucessoA dawn chorus made of species found nowhere else: the oriole's fluting, the thrush, the weavers' chatter, the giant sunbird's rattle from the canopy, speirops flocks; the croak of the dwarf olive ibis in the deep forest at Monte Carmo in the first light, and the scops owl's whistle after dark. Dripping forest, streams, no traffic.
More: all spectacles in Nigeria · dawn choruses · Nigeria in January · Nigeria in February · Nigeria in December