Hi, Tweets--

My wife and I just returned from 8 days in Hawaii. It was warm and
breezy. We saw:

spotted Dove
barred (Zebra) Dove
red-crested Cardinal
house Finch
mejiro (Japanese white eye)
common mynah, (the starling of Hawaii)
red-vented bulbul, (the jay of Hawaii)
red-whiskered bulbul
red avadavat
black-bellied golden plover
lots of rock doves

In addition we made it over to the Big Island and saw

Pacific Golden Plover (in breeding plumage)
rice bird (nutmeg mannikin, or spotted munia)
northern cardinal
and an unidentified creeper or two

And, everywhere we went we saw the ubiquitous house sparrow! They were in
Honolulu, Hilo and even atop Kiluea...nothing stops them...not even altitude.

I told the ranger up on Kiluea I wanted to see the I'o, or rare Hawaiian
hawk. He said ordinarily, that bird didn't appear often in the park, but
coincidentally, he saw one that very morning on his way in to work glide
across the windshield of his car, spread its wings,"drop its gear"
and take an Apapane (nice reddish finch-type) right out of a bush by the
side of the road!


This was my first time birding in a tropical area and I had a lot of
difficulty locating birds in the dense, lush foliage. I heard a lot of birds,
but couldn't see most of them. They also seemed to be high. There was a
lot of action in the canopy. In Hilo we were on the 8th floor of the
hotel and saw many birds going by at eye level...didn't seem to be much
action down lower. We saw the Pu'u'o lava flow reach the road we were
standing on. It was advancing 8-10m/hr..burning trees and vegetation. We left
in late afternoon, came back after dark to see the orange lava better..it
was quite impressive. The next day it set the road on fire and the rangers
evacuated everyone because of toxicity of burning asphalt. The lava crossed
the road and dropped into the ocean.

Lot of sky..really dark and nicely quiet on the Big Island. If I could have
just found that I'o...sigh-h-h-h..

Tom







Tom Foote footet at elwha.evergreen.edu
The Evergreen State College 866-6000 x6118
Olympia, WA 98505