These little birds are far from rare, but watching a flock of them scuttling back and forth on the sand, in and out of the tide, is always a treat. And as you will notice, when they are foraging in earnest they not only stick their bills into the sand right up to the base… they go for total immersion of the head!
All photos: Keith Salvesen, Rolling Harbour Abaco
Smooth-billed Anis, Abaco – Gerlinde Taurer
In times of trouble, of grief and of despair, humans have an instinct to rally round for the greater good. Right now, I am very conscious that on Abaco – and indeed Grand Bahama – there is little or no time or mental space for overmuch concern about the wildlife. I am safely distanced from the tragedies and dire misfortunes of the countless individuals, families and communities affected by Hurricane Dorian. In this post I simply offer some images of birds – all photographed on Abaco – that are bonded together as adults or adult and chick, as symbolic of the huge combined human efforts on Abaco to comfort, restore, and rebuild a shattered island.
Northern Bobwhites, Abaco backcountry – Tom Sheley
Piping Plover, Delphi Beach Abaco – Keith Salvesen
Abaco Parrots – Peter Mantle
Neotropic Cormorants, Treasure Cay, Abaco – Bruce Hallett
Common Gallinule adult & chick, Abaco – Tom Sheley
Wilson’s Plover adult & chick, Abaco Bahamas – Sandy Walker
American Oystercatchers, Abaco Bahamas – Tom Sheley
CREDITS: Gerlinde Taurer (1); Tom Sheley (2, 6, 8); Keith Salvesen (3, 8); Peter Mantle (4); Bruce Hallett (5); Sandy Walker (7)
Sanderlings, Delphi Beach, Abaco Bahamas – Keith Salvesen
It’s often a hard decision whether to include a short piece of video footage in a post. By short, I mean less than a minute. On the one hand, there is usually a good reason for inclusion, even if only aesthetic. On the other, it simply takes up more time for busy people who may prefer to flick through an article and enjoy some nice images along the way. Today, you can have the best of both worlds.
Sanderlings are definitively ‘peeps’, a group name that embraces the smallest and squeakiest sandpiper species. They are the wave chasers, the tiny birds that scuttle along the beach, into the retreating tide for a snack from the sand, and back to the beach again as the waves creep in. Their little legs and feet move in a blur, and many people immediately think of wind-up clockwork toys as they watch the birds in action.
One of the joys of being a sanderling is that rock pools fill and empty diurnally. At some time during daylight, there’s the certainty of a quick dip. I was lying on the beach when I took this short video, so that I didn’t spook the birds. I was equipped with a smallish camera (I drowned it the following day. By mistake I mean) but I kept my distance rather than try to get closer and spoil their joyful bathing.
I caught these little birds at a critical moment. You can tell that the tide is coming in fast. The peeps are becoming edgy, and weighing up the joys of immersion in a pool with the less enjoyable prospect of being washed out of the pool by the next wave. Within a minute or so, they had all flocked down the shoreline for a foraging session.
Waves and incoming tide getting a little too close for comfort on the edge of the pool…
Next to the migratory PIPING PLOVERS that favour Abaco as their winter home, the wave chasers are my favourite shorebirds. My keenness on them killed my camera. I went out into the incoming waves to get shots back at the beach with the sun behind me. Great idea until I lost my balance with, as they say, hilarious consequences. Lesson learnt – never turn your back on waves.
All photos © Keith Salvesen / Rolling Harbour taken on the beach at Delphi, Abaco, Bahamas
One of the pleasures of watching birds (as opposed to BIRDWATCHING, a more committed-sounding enterprise with its own Wiki entry, that may require equipment, books & mag subs…) is to spend some time observing them enjoying themselves. Perhaps you have a feeder, and like to watch the birds getting stuck into the seeds, carelessly flicking the husks around and throwing their ‘feeder shapes’ on the perches. Maybe you like to see the hummers, beaks deep into the little red plastic flowers on the rim of the sugar-water feeder, tiny bodies motionless and upright, wings a glistening blur of rapid movement in the sun.
It is 5.30 pm. The sun is sinking in the early evening sky. The tide is on the rise at the north end of the Delphi beach where the reef joins the land. There is a small spit of sand that will be covered quite soon, but meanwhile two dozen sanderlings mixed in with assorted ruddy turnstones are doing their idiot feeding thing, rushing around on their tiny legs, stabbing in the sand, and generally behaving like clockwork toys on speed. Meanwhile a handful have found the fun to be had in the swirling tide as it pours round the head of the reef onto the sand spit. Yes, it’s sandpiper bath-time!
Towards mid-tide on the rise, the water begins to creep round the rocks and encroach onto the sandbar. At high tide, it is well under water and fish are back in residence. Small sharks sometimes hang in the waves just behind their breaking point over the shallow sand. And so the tidal process repeats.
For the sanderlings, the best part of the day is when the tide is rising. At ± mid-tide is the time for the shore birds to bathe in the tidal pools that form – and as the water pours in around the end of the rocks, it froths like an overenthusiastic bubblebath. Right then is an excellent time to sit peacefully on the beach and watch the entertainment…
Substantial immersion is not out of the question…
These moments don’t last long. Soon the increasing force and height of the water spoils the fun, and the flock will suddenly take flight and move south a little way along the beach, away from the rocks. There’s the incoming tideline to play with – and more importantly, food to be uncovered with each incoming and retreating wave…
All photos © Keith Salvesen / Rolling Harbour
South Abaco – the whole area south of Marsh Harbour – provides by far the best birding opportunities for a day of varied birding. A recent party led by birding guide Reginald Patterson included Charmaine Albury in the enthusiastic team. She sent me their checklist for the day – 40 species covering an impressive range of bird types. Here is the list, to which I have added some illustrative photographs.
BAHAMA PALM SHORES
1. Blackfaced Grassquit
2. Greater Antillean Bullfinch
3. Red-winged Blackbird
4. Gray Catbird
5. Abaco (Cuban) Parrots
6. Painted Bunting
7. Northern Mockingbird
8. La Sagra’s Flycatcher
9. Cuban Pewee
10. Yellow-throated Warbler
11. Western Spindalis
12. West Indian Woodpecker
13. Cape May Warbler
14. Ovenbird
15. Eurasian Collared Dove
16. Common Ground Dove
17. Bananaquit
18. Red-legged Thrush
19. Turkey Vulture
20. Cuban Emerald Hummingbird
21. Thick-billed Vireo
BPS Duck Pond
22. Blue-winged Teal
23. Green-winged Teal
24. Common Gallinule
SAWMILL SINK BLUE HOLE
25. Olive-capped Warbler
26. Yellow-rumped Warbler
27. Loggerhead Kingbird
28. Prairie Warbler
HIGHWAY ROADSIDE
29. Bahama Warbler
30. American Kestrel
GILPIN POND
31. White-cheeked (Bahama) Pintail
32. Great Egret
33. Great Blue Heron
34. Tricolored Heron
35. Lesser Yellowlegs
36. Solitary Sandpiper
SANDY POINT
37. Laughing gulls
38. Ruddy turnstone
39. Sanderlings
40. Royal terns
The checklist covers a broad range of birds that you might expect to see in habitats ranging from coppice to pine forest to water to shoreline. Most are permanent residents, with some winter residents (eg the painted bunting, Cape May warbler). Abaco specialities include the parrots of course, the West-Indian woodpecker and the olive-capped warbler.
And birds that might, on another day, be seen? Maybe the endemic Bahama Woodstar hummingbird and the endemic Bahama Swallow. At Gilpin Pond, black-necked stilts and perhaps a belted kingfisher. And at Sandy Point, brown pelicans fishing off the dock and the chance of white-tailed tropicbirds off-shore. But overall a ’40 day’ is a great day!
We are just back on Abaco last night, and without actually trying – and just from the balcony in about 20 minutes – we have scooped:
Turkey Vulture, Black-faced Grassquit, Bananaquit, Bahama Swallows, Loggerhead Kingbird, La Sagra’s Flycatcher, and Thick-billed Vireo – also Oystercatchers heard from the beach. Time to investigate further…
Credits: Tom Sheley (1); Keith Salvesen (2, 5, 8, 9); Craig Nash (3); Gerlinde Taurer (4, 6); Tom Reed (7); Nina Henry (10)
Looking back through some bird photo folders from last year, I came across these sanderlings that I photographed on the beach at Delphi. These little birds are far from rare, but watching a flock of them scuttling back and forth on the sand, in and out of the tide, is always a treat. And as you will notice, when they are foraging in earnest they not only stick their bills into the sand right up to the base… they go for total immersion of the head!
All photos: Keith Salvesen, Rolling Harbour Abaco
One of the pleasures of watching birds (as opposed to BIRDWATCHING, a more committed-sounding enterprise with its own Wiki entry, that may require equipment, books & mag subs…) is to spend some time observing them enjoying themselves. Perhaps you have a feeder, and like to watch the birds getting stuck into the seeds, carelessly flicking the husks around and throwing their ‘feeder shapes’ on the perches. Maybe you like to see the hummers, beaks deep into the little red plastic flowers on the rim of the sugar-water feeder, tiny bodies motionless and upright, wings a glistening blur of rapid movement in the sun.
Well, join me at Sanderling Bath Time on the Delphi Beach. We are the north end, where the exposed rocks of the reef curve round towards the beach. At low tide, there’s a sandbar bridge from beach to rocks. It is a perfect feeding area for shore birds. Sanderlings, ruddy turnstones, least sandpipers, Wilson’s plovers and the prized piping plovers forage happily together here.
Towards mid-tide on the rise, the water begins to creep round the rocks and encroach onto the sandbar. At high tide, it is well under water and fish are back in residence. Small sharks sometimes hang in the waves just behind their breaking point over the shallow sand. And so the tidal process repeats. But ± mid-tide is the time for the shore birds to bathe in the tidal pools that form – and become frothier as the water pours in. And it’s an excellent time to sit peacefully on the beach and watch the entertainment…
Substantial immersion is not out of the question…
These moments don’t last long. Soon the increasing force and height of the water spoils the fun, and the flock will suddenly take flight and move south a little way along the beach, away from the rocks. There’s the incoming tideline to play with – and more importantly, food to be uncovered with each incoming and retreating wave…
All photos © Rolling Harbour
SANDERLINGS ON ABACO: GOTTA LOVE ‘EM
Sanderlings. Wind them up with the concealed key under their left wing, and they will charge up and down the beach for an hour or two, pausing only to rip some small unsuspecting mollusk or crustacean from its sandy bed. These birds are tiny. And smart. They know all about how a retreating tide will expose the goodies. They are even happy to plunge their heads right under water (#2). They’re not really jumpy, if you don’t push your luck or have a dog with you. The best ploy of all is to find a flock near the tideline, choose a place to lie comfortably in dry sand (with a camera, I mean, otherwise you may look look a bit strange), and wait for them to come into range. Usually they are so busy, what with all that rushing around and feeding, that they will ignore you. So the hard part, after you have taken some photos, is catching the little so-and-sos to wind them up again…
VIDEO 1 In which we notice the scuttling and scooting around of sanderlings on a mission
VIDEO 2 In which we admire bathtime in a tide-pool and assorted comings & goings…
All photos and movies RH
Sanderling, Delphi Beach, Abaco
It’s here again – GBD, the second Global Big Day. A chance for anyone and everyone to participate in a worldwide celebration of birds at just the level you choose.
No need to try to cover 100 square miles in a day and record 300 species. Unless you want to, of course. You could as easily spend an hour or two in a garden. In a clearing in the coppice. Down a track in the pine forest. Sitting on the beach with a cooler full of beer. Whatever suits you.
Western Spindalis, Delphi, Abaco
As the second Saturday in May, today also happens to be the official IMDB – International Migratory Bird Day – for the U.S. and Canada (the Caribbean is in October – reversed migration routes. Geddit?).
However, this post is not primarily about that event, but rather an encouragement to people to join in with some easygoing birding today. And if you happened to want to do it tomorrow, that’s OK too! If you want to send me your checklist (iphone photo should be fine), please do. Or send 2 or 3 best photos, and I’ll post my favourites – though preferably rather than post to my FB page, email to rollingharbour.delphiATgmail.com .
Palm Warbler, Delphi: a migratory warbler. Unlikely to be on Abaco – all hightailed north by now
Wherever you happen to be, just take a little time to look for some birds. There are plenty of places you can rule out straight away. Indoors for example. So it means being in the fresh air. And it’s probably best to set an hour or so as a minimum target time to spend on the task.
Green Heron hunting (successfully) – Gilpin Point pond, Abaco
WHAT DO I NEED?
Keep it simple. A pen that works. A spare pen just in case. A note book or even a large sheet of paper. Binoculars maybe. Camera if you are that way inclined. Sustenance. Maybe a friend for a joint effort. Possibly a bird book. If you have a North American one, it will help with most of the species you are likely to encounter.
Antillean Bullfinch, Delphi, Abaco
In an ideal world you would then upload your checklist officially to eBird by May 17 so that your findings can be included in the global statistics. Or you could pass your record to a local birding group to upload for you. Or just have a bit of fun, why not, and see how many different birds you can find (even if you can’t put a name to them). Last year 268 Caribbean species were recorded. Imagine if one of yours was the only one of its kind to be seen?
Bananaquit, Delphi, Abaco
WHY DO IT?
The stats gleaned from this initiative, and others like it (‘Shorebird Day’; ‘Warbler Day’ etc) are a good indicator of the state of health of the bird population both in general and by location. Perhaps an area previously having worrying low numbers for a particular species will show an encouraging upswing, indicating a successful breeding season and / or effective habitat protection initiatives. Or maybe one species will show an unexpectedly low figure, indicating a need for research and the instigation of protection measures.
Red-tailed Hawk giving me ‘The Look’
So every return made for every region in the world is significant; and if you can add 20 species to the count, you will be adding to the vast fund of accumulated knowledge that in the long term helps to preserve the birds that surround us.
Let the count begin…
Royal Tern, The Marls, Abaco – taken while fishing. Camera + rod. Cool, huh?)
All photos: Keith Salvesen, taken on Abaco (ok, you got me there, not the red-tailed hawk, which is a cheat and was taken in Central Park NYC. Never got this close on Abaco. But I like it anyway)
Good grief, this is awful. Suddenly I’m channelling Belinda Carlisle, raucous chanteuse and former lead vokes with the Go-Gos. She has not impinged on my cerebral cortex for, oh, 20 years. And even then, not of my own volition. Yet as soon as I downloaded and checked on-screen this sequence of sanderling photos taken as they foraged greedily on the Delphi beach, a spooky thing happened. The dread words and tune of ‘We Want The Same Thing’ crackled round my synapses. Listen! Can you hear it too?
It should of course have been “We Want The Same Crustaceans, Mollusks and Worms”, but no one has written that song. Yet. And I am now left with Belinda’s ear-worm… and other ones from that exhausting back catalogue are crowding in to join it, not least “Circle in the Sand” and “Heaven is that Delphi Place on Earth”…
“We Want the Same Thing”, though we have an entire beach to forage on…
OPTIONAL MUSICAL DIVERSION (YOU WERE WARNED)
All photos RH on the Delphi Beach, Abaco; musical stuff inspired by Ms Carlisle. Weird.
Various matters have kept me from the Blogosphere over the last week, so this is the first post for 2015. And what gorgeous little birds to have to hand for it – the Sanderling Calidris alba, a small sandpiper or ‘stint’ that is a common and welcome winter sight on the shorelines of Abaco, as in many other parts of the world. Who can resist these little guys, the ‘wave chasers’ that work along the shoreline, rapidly following the surf as food is exposed on the tide. Sometimes they will actually run into the ripples of an incoming wave to snap up a morsel of food, before scuttling back up the beach. They have been likened to clockwork toys. Amusing and cheering little birds to watch, so here is a gallery of them to enjoy and to welcome in the new year.
Classic Sanderling foraging area in the wet sand left by the retreating tideThe birds are small and fly fast: a clear ‘in-flight’ photo is a great achievement
This sandpiper was taken by the late Tony Hepburn on Abaco. It has been ringed in its summer breeding grounds, and feeds in wave-softened sand with the tidal foam still visible all around it.
This made me chortle… Sanderling Lonelyheart!
Credits: Craig Nash (1 – 3); Alex Hughes (4 – 7); Tom Sheley (8 – 9); Tony Hepburn (10)
Yesterday I featured 8 of the larger, longer-billed species among Abaco’s 33 shorebirds. Plus one cute Wilson’s Plover chick as page-bait! A number of those are classified as sandpipers. To see them, click HERE. Today it’s the turn of the smaller sandpiper species, little birds with long beaks for their size that in general help differentiate them from the stubby-beaked plover species. To recap, here is the main Abaco shorebird checklist of 26 species (birds previously featured in bold):
The codes will tell you, for any particular bird, when you may see it (P = permanent, WR = winter resident, TR = transient, V = vagrant); whether it breeds (B) on Abaco; and your chance of seeing it, graded from easy (1) to vanishingly unlikely (5).
The other 7 species of shorebird recorded for Abaco – all transients or vagrants – are: Upland Sandpiper TR 4, Whimbrel TR 4, Hudsonian Godwit V5, Marbled Godwit V5, Buff-breasted Sandpiper V5, Pectoral Sandpiper TR 3, Stilt Sandpiper TR 3
SANDPIPERS
Of the sandpiper species shown below, 9 of the 10 are ones that, at the right time and in the right place, you may see on Abaco. The tenth, the Wilson’s Phalarope, is the first specimen ever recorded for Abaco and as far as is known this is the only photo of it (props to Woody Bracey for this accomplished ‘get’). Again, some of the birds shown below were photographed on the Delphi Club beach.
SPOTTED SANDPIPER Actitis macularius WR 1
SOLITARY SANDPIPER Tringa solitaria WR 2
RUDDY TURNSTONE Arenaria interpres PR 2
RED KNOT Calidris canutus (non-breeding plumage) WR 3
SANDERLING Calidris alba WR 1
LEAST SANDPIPER Calidris minutilla WR 2
WHITE-RUMPED SANDPIPER Calidris fuscicollis TR 3
SEMIPALMATED SANDPIPER Calidris pusilla TR 2
WESTERN SANDPIPER Calidris Mauri TR 2
WILSON’S PHALAROPE Phalaropus tricolor V 4 
RELATED POSTS
Photo Credits: Tom Sheley, D Robertson, Becky Marvil, Craig Nash, RH, Tony Hepburn, Bruce Hallett, Woody Bracey
ROLLING HARBOUR ABACO 
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