When William and Karen , the current owners of Kusane Farm, first came up to check out the property that would ultimately become their home it was not looking at its bounteous best. One of the worst fires to hit the KZN Midlands in decades had just swept through the area leaving behind it a black expanse of desolation.

The Kusane house and farm outbuildings had been completely guttered and reduced to a smouldering ruin. Little remained of the once extensive garden. There was hardly a good tree left.

As a result, many of the birds, like the previous owners, had departed. When I first started coming up to visit them at weekends, all I remember seeing is a solitary Amethyst (formerly Black) Sunbird, a pair of Cape Robins, some cheery Bluff-streaked Chat – hopping among the rocks around the side of the house – and a few Village (formerly Spotted-backed) Weavers, still living in their swinging homes amongst the branches.

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William and Karen are not ones to shrink from a challenge or let a little adversity stand in their way. Undeterred, they started rebuilding from scratch. Slowly a phoenix emerged out of the ashes.

A very beautiful phoenix too.

While they were busy rebuilding, I took it upon myself to start planting lots of indigenous trees, flowers, aloes and shrubs in the area where a shed had once stood and which they had now been designated as my new home.

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As the garden expanded and boomed, so the birds started to return.

The most noticeable – and voluble – increase has been the Village Weaver population. With the arrival of the rains each year our ever-growing flock go in to a frenzy of nest building and egg-hatching. From dawn to dusk you can see them hurtling back and forth chattering excitedly as they construct their wondrously crafted homes – many of which prove useless because, after a cursory inspection, the exacting female declares them to be unsuitable habitation.

Life can be full of thwarted hopes and disappointments when you are a male Village Weaver.

With the weavers came the cuckoos, in particular the Diderick’s Cuckoo, who parasites on the weavers’ nests, driving them in to a protective frenzy. The Red-chested (Piet-my-Vrou) and Black Cuckoos also pass through the garden although they mostly seem to prefer the wooded country down by the river.

On my very first day living up here, sitting in my studio working on my cartoon, I was stunned to see a Jacobin Cuckoo in the Tree Fuchsia (Halleria lucidia) outside the window. It is a bird I more commonly associate with dry bushveld. I saw it exactly a year later in more or less the same spot.

Over the years which have followed, I have grown accustomed to the daily rhythm of the birds lives. In the cold light of dawn they come venturing out looking for food, browsing and scurrying and fluttering about. The food table I have erected in the middle of my lawn is always a scene of restless, unremitting activity with the highly aggressive male Pin-tailed Whydah doing his best to protect his food source – and impress his inscrutable little wife – by constantly trying to drive away the other birds which have gathered there.

Again, it is a thankless task because he is vastly outnumbered and as soon as he moves away the other birds come back.

Sun-up is also the time when the birds do most of their calling (the infernal rooster starts much earlier) and courtship rituals. I especially love hearing the Southern Boubous with their double-call: the cock calling and the female answering with a different tune. Most comforting of all is the endless coo-ing of the Cape Turtle Doves.

Waking up to its familiar “Work harder! Work harder!”, I rejoice in the fact I live in Africa.

The morning mists and our relatively high rainfall (by South African standards anyway) mean that maintaining a garden is not a constant battle as it can be elsewhere in this arid, water-challenged country. Most shrubs and flowers grow relatively easy, a fact which does not go unnoticed by the birds.

Sunbirds with their long curved beaks and quivering wings are always busy in the wild dagga (Leonotis leonorus) bushes and the ever-flowering Cape Fuchsia (Phygelius capensis) I have planted next to the fish pond and (in the winter months) the aloes. So too are the little Cape White-eyes.

As the garden has grown, our resident Ameythst Sunbird has been joined by others types of sunbird, including the gorgeous Malachite Sunbird with its pencil-long tail. A translucent, iridescent green, as they fly they glitter in the sunlight like some precious sapphire.

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In a sense, they are like an eager labour force, helping keep all the plants pollinated.

Besides the boubou and the sunbirds there are two other birds I deem essential for any proper, self-respecting garden: the robin and the thrush. We get the cheerful little Cape Robin and the ever-busy Olive Thrush.

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There is one other bird I would also consider adding to this list – a wagtail. Our pair of Cape Wagtails have become very tame, frequently joining me on the verandah when I have my morning cup of coffee. There is something both comical and endearing about their ever-moving, constantly bobbing little bodies, as they parade themselves in front of me.

My home has also become a home for various other birds. I have a pair of Rock Pigeons nesting on my verandah who never seem to tire of breeding, producing batch after batch of chicks.

The persistent female Amethyst Sunbird had less luck. First, she tried building her elaborately constructed little nest on both of the air-plants hanging from the beams.

Then she changed her plan. Maybe she wanted more privacy or perhaps she was just not happy with the view but she relocated around the corner and attached her home to the TV satellite dish.

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Unfortunately, even though she did manage to hatch her eggs a couple of times, in every instance some mysterious creature either killed the chicks or ripped the nest to shreds.

I also have pair of Red-winged Starlings living around the back of The Barn. They may make an attractive-looking couple but they are also very bold, noisy and aggressive birds and highly protective of their turf. I am often woken up by them in the early hours of the morning banging things on my corrugated-iron roof.

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The one year a pair of Cape Sparrows also successfully raised a clutch of chicks on the other end of the verandah to the pigeons’ apartment although, for some reason, they did not return after that even though I still see both birds regularly at my bird feeder.

Brighter than any illustration could ever be, the Black-headed Oriole is another regular in the garden. For a long time there just seemed to be the one. All day you would hear its beautifully liquid song echoing from tree to tree as it tried to attract a mate. Eventually it did just that and then it became an even lovelier duet.

Another bird I frequently hear calling from the fringes of the property but don’t always see is the Red-throated Wryneck, a rather odd bird that looks like a cross between a woodpecker and a cuckoo. Its squeaky “kweeek!”, urgent and relentless, is not nearly as melodious as the oriole.

Sometimes I find it easier to bird by ear. I often hear the lonely, heart-piercing call of the African Fish Eagle as it passes down the valley on its scheduled flight between the dams (the male who is slightly smaller than the female has a higher pitched call). I keep hoping it will land in a tree up here but so far it never has.

Because we inherited a very old orchard with the farm, we also inherited several species of fruit-eating birds along with it. The two most common of these are the ebullient, ever-cheerful, Black-eyed Bulbul and the comical, clumsy Speckled Mousebird. These two species are definitely the comedians of Kusane.

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Then there are the free and independent spirits, who breeze in, hang around for a while and then move on. The beautiful African Hoopoe, with his magnificent crest and odd, dipping flight, is one such bird; so, too, is the small Cardinal Woodpecker who every once in a while I will hear hammering away on some dead branch.

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Finally you get the rarities and vagrants.

Working in my garden the one day I was thrilled to see the dainty little Fairy Flycatcher with its distinctive grey, black and white plumage creeping through the undergrowth. Although they are not uncommon in the high-lying areas (and also the Karoo) it is the only time I have seen one here.

At the other end of the spectrum you get the big guys. The one afternoon I was lying on my bed, reading a book when I heard something loud and flappy crashing clumsily in to the topmost branches of the tall fir tree around the back. The moment it started its extraordinary, high-pitched, screaming – just like a baby throwing a tantrum – I knew instantly what it was: a Trumpeter Hornbill.

The day was heavy with mist, so I can only assume it had got separated from the main flock and then got hopelessly lost. Whatever the reason, the resident Fort-tailed Drongo wasn’t having it to stay and immediately started furiously dive-bombing the confused and very distressed hornbill.

The last I saw of it, the cumbersome bird was still flapping and sailing, labouring and gliding towards the distant Karkloof Hills, closely pursued by the much smaller drongo.

Returning to my book and bed, I offered up a silent prayer of thanks that he has not been able to chase me off the farm – yet…