SCRABBLE® ADDICTS APART, the term tsunami was not, until late December, a common component of our day-to-day vocabulary. Since December 26, 2004, when that great wall of water generated by a Richter-Scale-9.0 earthquake beneath the Indian Ocean floor smashed into coastlines from Sumatra to Somalia, scarcely a news program airs without mention of it.

With more than 230,000 human fatalities and millions more injured, missing or homeless, it is hard to grasp the sheer magnitude of the event despite the constant bombardment of harrowing images over the television and on the internet.

Inevitably the pseudo-scientists have been out claiming that these animals have some sixth sense, a “seismic sense” if you like.

Now, as the major economic powers seem to be tripping over themselves to see who can provide the greatest amount of aid, it is possible to look into other aspects of the phenomenon, one of the most interesting of which is the reaction shown by animals to the oncoming tsunami. Certainly there seem to have been far fewer animal casualties than might have been expected though, as Roger Highfield, Science Editor of the British Daily Telegraph points out (Friday, Jan. 7th), this could just be that in the midst of the human carnage TV cameramen might simply not be training their cameras on the likes of sheep and goat corpses.

There have been plenty of anecdotal stories. In the Yala National Park in Sri Lanka, over 40 people lost their lives but the only animal casualties were a brace of water buffalo, while in the town of Dickwella bats were seen flying inland moments before the wave struck. In India, a whole colony of flamingoes was reported flying out of the path of the tsunami and to higher ground. Interestingly, many tales have involved elephants.

In Thailand an elephant was claimed to have rescued two young girls by sweeping them up in his trunk and heading for higher ground before the wave struck. In Sumatra elephants used in giving tourists rides along the beach ignored their mahouts and headed inland, trumpeting, while once more in Yala, three elephants were seen running away from the beach a full hour before the water struck. Inevitably the pseudo-scientists have been out claiming that these animals have some sixth sense, a “seismic sense” if you like. Highfield is extremely skeptical of this and argues that the reported behavior can be explained by much more conventional means.

First, he points out that animals “have keener senses [than humans], greater awareness of their surroundings and are hard-wired to take prompt action.” Of the senses we humans possess, four taste, smell, hearing and touch are pretty pathetically developed compared with many creatures. We rely largely on vision, a fact prosaically described as ‘seeing is believing.’

Elephants, for example, can hear sounds at much lower frequencies than humans: infrasonic sound. The mega-low rumble generated by the earthquake may well have been heard by the elephants long in advance of the tsunami and hence explained their aberrant behavior. And animals take cues from each other. Once one animal is alerted, its alarm calls and unusual behavior may invoke escape responses in other species. As for the apparent paucity of animal corpses in many areas, the larger animals do not live on or near the seashore. It’s humans that populate these areas with their hotels, cabanas, beach beds and the like. Where humans reign, animals, especially larger animals, generally retreat.

Of special concern are the coral reefs that surround many of the coasts of these Indian Ocean countries. Tsunamis particularly affect very low-lying areas such as the Andaman and Nicobar Islands where the Indian Zoological Survey is already planning a damage assessment. Not only do the reefs play host to a vast variety of endangered marine species but they are also critically important for the local economies, either as fishing grounds or for dive tourism.

While I have never, thankfully, felt the wrath of a tsunami, I have seen the damage Nature can inflict upon its own reefs. Some years ago I was in southern India in a place called Mahabalipuram, famed for its ancient shore temples. I rented a snorkel, mask and fins and went with some fishermen to snorkel in the reefs offshore. The previous year, the reefs had been hit by a particularly fierce typhoon that had not only shattered them but had caused the substrate pouring into the sea from swollen rivers to smother the corals with sediment. There was little living coral left and hence little else left of the ecosystem. It was like snorkeling over an underwater bomb site.

But to brighter news. This month one of Egypt’s most spectacular birds, or at least the male (Nature is not always politically correct), will be assuming his nuptial plumage and displaying in the most flamboyant fashion. The bird in question is the Nile Valley sunbird. In winter both sexes look alike, tiny (9-10 cm long), pale gray above and washed yellow below, with a slender slightly down-curved bill. By February the male is

transformed into a glossy green extrovert with a brilliant sulfur-yellow belly and long tail streamers that add an extra five centimeters or so to its length. He is stunning, and one is tempted to think that he knows it.

Once transformed, he will be puffing up and parading his newfound finery and courting his duller mate. His display includes a hovering flight, flaunting his wedding excess, accompanied by body rocking and wing-whirring. Nile Valley sunbirds have been recorded breeding as far north as Cairo, though the best place to catch up with them is Aswan. I have seen the males in full breeding plumage as early as January south of Khartoum in Sudan. The nest is an elaborate bottle-shaped construction of plant fibers, feathers, spiders’ webs etc. in which white eggs are laid and incubated solely by the female.

Aswan is one of the best places to spend a few days at this time of year. The islands south of the Old Aswan Dam provide excellent views of some of Egypt’s most spectacular heron and egret species. It is too wet for cattle egrets but little egrets abound, as well as much rarer fare such as purple herons, green-backed herons and black-crowned night herons. The latter are as impressive as a superbly filmed black and white movie. Color is utterly unnecessary. They are stocky, fairly short-billed with gray upper-parts, a black ‘cloak,’ paler under-parts and a long plumed double crest. By day, you must look hard in the acacias and other trees that line the Nile’s banks as they hide up. At dusk they emerge on rather broad, almost moth-like wings to forage on the riverbanks without diurnal competition.

Then there are the kingfishers. The pied kingfishers in Aswan are ubiquitous, instantly recognizable by their black and white plumage and by their high-pitched jabbering that seems in total contrast to their stout, macho bill. And not to mention that flash of pure cobalt across the water that marks the common kingfisher, common not here but in Europe.

Treasure that flash. There is far too little color in the world without it. et