INTRODUCTION

During the period June 1986 to June 1990, I worked in Maputo, Mozambique as an expert in graphic production of schoolbooks. The studies that I present here has been carried out during weekends and other spare time and are totally financed by myself.
Unfortunately, the security situation in Mozambique put obstacles in my way to make more complete studies. I hope that the future will enable me or another person to continue these studies.
Here I summarise the ringing results and biometric data collected during four years of sporadic ringing.
A complete checklist of all birds observed in Maputo, with surroundings, during each month of the year, is also presented in the species list.

LOCATION

Maputo (25°52'S, 32°35'E), the capital of Mozambique is a city with a lot of people, a lot of problems but still a beautiful town with plentiful of green areas scattered over the area. Because of its location (coastal etc) there is a great diversity of species even in the city, see the species list.
I have, almost without exceptions, been using the same location for my nets. A steep slope heading eastwards, covered with scrub (1-3 meters height), situated just above the Clube Naval and overlooking the Maputo Bay. This spot was easy accessed by a tarred road.
I have identified birds of 121 different species at the ringing place and a total of 261 in Maputo town (including Inhaca Islands), see the species list.
Both mozambicans and others showed a lot of interest in my activities.

METHODS

For 68 days, mostly Sundays between 05.30 and 10.00 pm I have put up my 2 nets. Almost always I have used the same arrangement for the nets (even the same holes for the poles). The nets were arranged in an angel of 90° wich means that one net was parallell with the slope and the other perpendicular to the apex at the lowest left point .
Normally I used a 12x2,1 m 4-shelf net with 16 mm mesh (50d/2ply). This mesh-size is a little bit to small for e.g. Burschell's Coucal which were present during almost every session. They, and also other birds, just kicked, laying on their back, their way out of the net (especially Speckeled Mousebirds, Colius striatus). No decoys, tape-recorders or other sources were used to attract the birds.
During 532,25 net-hours 519 birds of 60 species were caught which gives an average of 1,18 birds/net-hour. This resulted in 6 398 measurements to process. For all measurements taken, I have followed the methods described in Svensson, 1984. Details will be published soon (please remind me!).

STATISTICS

For the statistics I have used a Macintosh computer together with Data Desk Professional and Microsoft Excel software. I have not drawn any conclusions from the material , as the number of observations is to small in most cases. Still I have chosen to publish the material as there are very few data known from live birds for many of the species ringed.

RECAPTURES

47 birds have been recaptured and re-measured which is 7,45% of the total material. Maximum time elapsed between catches was 609 days (male African Firefinch, Lagonostica rubricata) . I have not recorded or listed recaptures during the same day. A Green-backed Camaroptera, Camaroptera brachyura, was caught at five different occasions.
Details will be published soon (please remind me!).

LITERATURE

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I thank Mr Terry Oatley at the South African Ringing Unit (SAFRING) for the service and encouragement he has supported me with.