The following series of images are I believe some of the first photographs ever taken of this endangered species.

This is a severely range-restricted coastal East African species confined to a few remnant Brachystegia woodlands in Tanzania's Eastern Usambara & Udzungwa mountains & to Kenya's Arabuko-Sokoke Forest.

In Arabuko-Sokoke these birds are apparently restricted to the canopy of more mature Brachystegia stands in white sand-soil forest where they favour trees sporting heavy growths of a 'Spanish moss' -type epiphytic moss. The birds always seemed to be high up at around 10-20 metres & seemed to spend most of their time gleaning insects from the high branches & especially the hanging moss 'gardens'.
David Ngala is well acquainted with these birds. He advised that the males defend territories which contain trees with extensive moss 'gardens' & I was able to observe such scraps (one of the images shows a male singing & posturing to another male out of camera-shot). He showed me a tree which had held a nest ( 2 years ago) -the nest being made of & suspended within some of the hanging moss.

It seems that mature Brachystegia trees festooned with epiphytic moss are key to the well-being of these sunbirds & that insects probably comprise a much larger proportion of their diet than classical nectar-sippers such as Collared Sunbird.

Outside of Arabuko-Sokoke forest these birds are trapped in ever-shrinking islands of woodland remnant resulting in fragmented & possibly non-viable declining populations.
Arabuko-Sokoke Forest though ostensibly protected also suffers from illegal logging for firewood & especially to source raw material for wood-carvings to supply the insatiable demands of tourists for African ethnic artworks. This latter problem specifically targets mature trees of certain species which though not reducing the extent of the forest results in reduction of biodiversity & threatens the survival of species such as the Amani sunbird.

For further information on Amani Sunbird check out: http://www.birdlife.org/datazone/ebas/index.html?action=SpcHTMDetails.asp&sid=8242&m=0