Twenty-three new bird species for Angola, including Mayombe National Park in Cabinda Province, and other noteworthy records

Abstract

The avifauna of Cabinda Province, Angola, is poorly known; since 1885 only one ornithological expedition has been made to the province, by AA da Rosa Pinto in 1969. All previous works that include Cabinda, including those of Rosa Pinto, were confined to the coastal and central zones (Lower Mayombe), with the higher-altitude eastern zone (Upper Mayombe) completely unexplored. With access to Cabinda recently improved, we made four short field trips (in 18–21 March 2022, 15–17 June 2022, 23–27 September 2022, and 3–10 June 2023), focused mainly on the Upper Mayombe area, as part of an ongoing effort to make biological inventories for poorly known regions of Angola, which include Mayombe National Park. We recorded 256 bird species: 101, 139, 157 and 187 during Visits 1–4, respectively. Among these were 23 new species records for Angola, most of which were either sound recorded or photographed as evidence. A further 11 species were new to Cabinda but had previously been recorded elsewhere in Angola, and an additional 34 species had previously been recorded fewer than ten times from Angola. These records highlight the biological importance of Mayombe National Park and its significant contribution to the overall biodiversity of Angola.