I was amazed by the lack of seabirds in this part of the world and we only had a few Brown Boobies and a solitary Red-footed Booby keeping us company on a few days. We saw very few gulls or terns and most of those were in ports - Royal Tern and Caspian Tern being the commonest.
Magnificent Frigatebirds were seen most days we docked but were usually distant but on one occasion a pair came close to the ship enabling me to get a few photos - females have the white heads and chest.
Star bird of the trip for me was Red-billed Tropic birds. As we went on a kayaking trip to Greater Bird Island (Antigua) I didn't take the camera! It was amazing birds flying over our heads.
Bananaquits were everywhere and probably the commonest bird we saw.
A couple of trips further inland to forested areas produced birds such as Lesser Antillean Bullfinch and Pearly-eyed Thrasher.
Humming birds were fairly common and we saw two species - Antillean Crested (top photo below) and Green-throated Carib. Both were extremely difficult to photograph with such a small lens!
On one of the trips into rain forest habitat we picked up a Bridled Quail Dove which I understand is pretty scarce and hard to see.
Other common birds seen were Carib Grackle, Common Ground Dove, Zenaida Dove, Scaly-naped Pigeon, Gray Kingbird, Shiny Cowbird and Black-faced Grassquit.
Wading birds were scarce with the moat regularly encountered being the ubiquitous Cattle Egret.We did see the occasional Snowy Egret (mainly in the mangroves) and a couple of Little Blue Herons including a showy bird fishing on the beach on Bequia (St Vincent & the Grenadines).
The only waders seen were a few Turnstone on Barbados whilst raptors were extremely scarce with only a single Osprey and Red-tailed Hawk being seen.
A great trip and a few birds added to my World list!
1 comment :
Well done mate, some good birds there, had a week in Tobago last year and would go back in a heartbeat
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