This last summer we headed to Bird Island, a tropical paradise off the east coast of Africa. Bird Island is best known for its luxurious resorts, many on their own private islands. However, we were not looking for beach time but for birds, so we went to the northern most island in the archipelago aptly called Bird Island as it hosts literally tens of thousands of snooty terns on its small land mass (a quarter square mile)
And it didn’t disappoint as the terns had arrived and were nesting on the northern end of island. The terns nest of the ground, which is no problem here as there are no predators on the island, the largest mammal is the mice – which instead of brothering the birds tried to make our villa its home.
In addition to being many, the terns also got close, enabling many shots using wide angle lens
Bird Island is tropical (4 degrees south) so one of the prettiest birds on the island is the beautiful Tropic Bird.
Another all white bird is the White Tern, also known as the fairy tern .
The Fairy (White) Terns were well along in their breeding season, their chicks having hatched and were very hungry. Feeding them was a full time job.
While the fairy terns feed their chicks whole fish, the snooty terns regurgitate food for their chicks.
At the other end of the breeding cycle the Lessor Noody’s were just starting their nest building.
A typical tropical island, Bird Island had beautiful sunny days with near daily tropical rain squalls
As seabirds, the snooty terns drink sea water, and not fresh water. This gave rise to a daily show as the terns went for their drink in the ocean just off the shore each day.
While a picture says ten thousand words, a video can say ten million about this magical island and its birds
Since we were already halfway around the world and close to Africa, after our time on bird Island we headed to Southern Tanzania, with a whole different ecosystem and target wildife to photograph. You can find our report here. Tanzania