Small flocks of African silverbills can often be seen, flitting from tree to tree, on the dry side of the Big Island. Sometimes they’ll be mixed in with other birds such as nutmeg mannikins, but this group was all silverbills.
Category Archives: Birds
Pacific golden-plover
A while ago I did a week’s worth of posts in response to a WordPress photo challenge on the theme of ‘evanescent.’ I thought I’d take a similar approach to this week’s theme, ‘transient,’ which is basically a synonym of evanescent.
Migrating birds are transient, in that they spend time in one area where they breed before moving to regular wintering grounds. The Pacific golden-plover is one such bird. After wintering in Hawaii, these birds fly north to spend May, June, and July at breeding grounds in the Arctic. Not only that, but this is one bird that dresses for the occasion! Normally, a mostly brown bird with flecks of yellow (as seen here), its summer plumage takes on this splendid black and white frontage.
Hawai‘i ‘amakihi
‘Amakihi are endemic honeycreepers and the different islands have slightly different versions of the bird. The Hawai‘i ‘amakihi is very similar to the Maui ‘amakihi, but the O‘ahu and Kaua‘i birds have more noticeable differences. They’re one native bird that has adapted relatively well to changing habitat and introduced diseases including avian malaria.
This one was feeding from bright yellow māmane flowers at the Palila Forest Discovery Trail on the southwest slope of Mauna Kea.
Cattle and egrets
I’m not sure one could call cows and cattle egrets friends. When cows graze, cattle egrets snaffle bugs stirred up in that process, but I don’t know of anything the egrets do for the cows in return.
However, this photo has a friendly feel to it. I picture the cow saying, ‘So you can fly, right? Could you teach me how?’ The egrets look suitably nonplussed at the suggestion.
Feel free to suggest your own caption in the comments.
Islet and tropicbird
A tropicbird wheels over an islet, and its lone, tenacious tree, off the North Kohala coast.
Red-billed leiothrix
This is the last of my series of posts in response to this week’s WordPress photo challenge on the theme of ‘evanescent.’
Picture the scene: I’m sitting quietly in my living room when a small shape flits past a window accompanied by a harsh chittering. I jump up, grab my camera and rush outside. As I do so, I turn the camera on, adjust settings and figure out the best place to intercept the bird that just flew by. I go around the house and sure enough, the sound is loud. And there it is, in the hedge. I raise the camera, but its gone. Over there now. I move, refocus. There it is again. I snap a photo. Gone again. I do this a couple more times, and then it goes quiet. There’s no more movement. The bird’s moved on.
Now repeat this scene, a couple of times a week and you have my experience with the red-billed leiothrix. It’s such a beautiful bird, but all my efforts had produced was a collection of photos of bits of wing, disembodied beaks, barely discernable blurry shapes, or just bare branches and leaves. The jittery, hyperactive birds were evanescent, quickly disappearing from sight time after time.
So imagine my surprise when this one showed up. It was one of a pair. The other one, true to its kind, instantly disappeared into a bush. But this one appeared not to have read the leiothrix operation manual. It stayed on this branch, in full view, for a couple of minutes. True, it wasn’t ever exactly stationary, it’s head going from side to side every two seconds. And it called out continuously, probably wanting to know why its partner was skulking in the bush. Somewhere the message must have got through because the bird joined its partner and the two of them, true to form, flitted off from branch to branch, through the hedge and disappeared from view.
Kalij pheasant
I saw this male Kalij pheasant, with two others, alongside the Powerline Trail, off Saddle Road. I hadn’t noticed them while walking through the trees on the dead-straight trail, but I became aware of a slight but steady clucking sound and stopped to locate it. The birds were picking their way through some dense undergrowth and seemed not the least bit bothered by my presence. Perhaps they were aware it wasn’t one of the days when archery hunting is permitted.
For more information about the Powerline Trail, go to bigislandhikes.com/puu-oo-trail/.
Java sparrow
I like Java sparrows. With their big pink beak, white cheeks, and pinkish ring around the eyes they have a cheerful air about them. They’re an introduced species, from Indonesia, and quite common on all the islands.
Graham's Island 