TRIP REPORTS FROM HAWAI'I AND THE PACIFIC

by David Watson and Abby Brown-Watson


Conditions:

The islands are pretty easy to get around in with a rented car. Many roads are unpaved, and four wheel drive is occasionally necessary. Once we used a cab for the day and once a guide's truck. Getting to the Rock Islands of Palau requires a boat. The jungle paths are usually hiking level three or less, but very steamy and muddy. Hiking is often slowed by mud or roots. On any of the islands there can be torrential rain any day and will certainly be on Pohnpei. Everywhere the humidity is very high.

The birds are fairly easy to find, with a few frustrating exceptions--fruit doves and megapodes--and there are no difficult distinctions between the endemic species. A couple of the winter peeps drove us crazy.

Every island has good hotels. Here's where we stayed:

Kosrae--Kosrae Village, on the east coast of the island. Rustic thatch roofs in the jungle on the beach with shorebirds and great food.
Pohnpei--The Village, Sophisticated thatch roofs with a special long house to gather in, the most interesting hotel in Micronesia, a must to stay in.
Palau--Palau Pacific Resort; we were feeling rich, celebrating an anniversary. Elegant; expensive.
Yap--Pathways Hotel. More thatch roofs, nice view, helpful staff.
Saipan and Tinian--stayed with friends.

Map 1. Micronesia

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The people of Micronesia were very friendly. Several times as we were walking down a road birding someone would stop to offer us a ride. There were lots of smiles, and many people speak English. All the smiles are red, as everyone chews betel nut which stains everything it touches. On Yap people are more reserved--they want to minimize contact
with Western ways--but were still very friendly. One of our best memories is talking with a group of men from one of the remote Yapese islands, Woleai, all of them wearing blue loin cloths. A few women on Yap go bare breasted, but not so many it distracts from the birding.

Organization:

We will proceed island by island.
We will usually mention a bird only once, when we first see it, but this does not imply that we saw it on only one island. When mentioned more than once, we underline only the first time we actually saw the bird. Some birds are everywhere, some are endemic to one island. If you want to know where we saw specific birds on specific islands, please contact us. We'd love to talk about it. You can figure out from the charts in Pratt, Bruner & Berrett's "The birds of Hawaii and the tropical Pacific", what birds occur on each island.

Kosrae

A rickety old van picked us up at the airport. Learning that we were birders, the driver stopped at Bird Cave, about two miles from the airport. We drove inland a hundred feet, walked a few more and found a cave with hundreds of Island Swiftlets swinging in and out. It was our first indigenous bird, one we saw many more times in the islands. Red Junglefowl were all over the road, more feral than wild.
Several of the others we found right at our hotel which is on the east coast at about three o'clock. We saw the Micronesian Honeyeater--common here, not on Saipan--Micronesian Starling-- common everywhere--and the Kosrae endemic Gray White-eye, easy to hear and see. Almost every island has its own busy little white eye species. We wondered, why is there a different species on each island?

At low tide off the beach by the hotel, we found both the white and blue-gray morphs of the Pacific Reef Heron, fairly common all over Micronesia. There was an abundance of Pacific Golden Plovers--they own Micronesia--and lots of Tattlers, though it's hard to tell the Wandering from the Gray or Siberian (look for the white line across the forehead.) On the beach we also saw Fairy Terns (White Terns), Great Crested Tern, Black and Brown Noddies, and Ruddy Turnstones--also common throughout.

We began the frustrating experience of hearing but almost never seeing Fruit Doves, this time the Purple Crowned one. After birding in the U.S. we think of doves as relatively colorless, but the South Pacific has a number of extremely colorful fruit dove species. But try seeing one. Throughout Micronesia these buggers call from far away, an easy to identify dove call, but then shut up as one nears their tree and never move, so if you don't spot one of the little green buggers in the five million green leaves in which they live, you don't see one. Our ratio of seeing one versus hearing one was about one in a hundred. We glimpsed all three species, had good looks at only one or two birds, even though they are fairly common.

We also began hunting for the Micronesian Pigeon, a giant bird with a large wart on his nose who lives in the mountains. They are hunted for food, and so are very cautious. The only place we saw them well was in the Rock Islands preserve in Palau, where they are usually--but not always--safe from hunting. Another bird we looked for unsuccessfully was the Micronesian Megapode, who looks like a coot-chicken cross, and lives in deep forest well away from people. Truthfully, we did not expect to find one. In the Rock Islands we found their nest, a low mound of compost. At the southern end of Kosrae there is a large mangrove forest which we went through, under the boughs hanging into the water, in a motorized outrigger, looking for pigeons and fruit doves, but had to settle for an interesting rookery of Black Noddies, and our first glimpse of a Whimbrel.

Also in the south of the island, away from houses on the one road inland from Utwa in a mix of agriculture and forest, we saw the blue faced parrotfinch. Several people had said this was a hard to find bird, and we saw only this one the whole trip. Birds like this seem to pop up unpredictably; we just looked all the time, and occasionally saw something.

We flew to Pohnpei. The Micronesians take all the new security rules very seriously. We have to arrive at the airport-- which is smaller than many American houses--two and half hours early. Then we sit in the open air cement room and wait.

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Pohnpei

The grounds of The Village hotel, abut eight miles out of town on the northeast coast, are high on a hill, large and mostly jungle, We saw several target birds there. The Pohnpei Lori, an endemic parrot, fly by the long house viewing point and bar every now and then, screaming their heads off. White-tailed Tropicbirds frequently fly below the house.
The Pohnpei Fantail, a charming bird, is not afraid of people, and we had very close views in the underbrush. Fruit bats fly by. Everyone assumed that since we wanted to see birds, we also wanted to see bats, and over the month hundreds were pointed out to us. Some Micronesians eat them. Pretty common at The Village were Micronesian Kingfishers who don't just dive into water, but also eat insects and small mammals on the ground. We saw one Purple Capped Fruit Dove in the trees around the hotel, and heard many calling.

It was good to see so many birds on the hotel grounds, because it rained like mad about every hour. Torrential, wet you in a moment rain. Pohnpei is said to be the second wettest spot on earth. As we gazed down the hill and across the bay to an island at the edge of the reef, Bob Arthur, the hotel owner-manager explained, "We use that island to tell the weather. If you can't see that island, it is raining. If you can see it, it is going to rain."

We took a boat and kayak tour to Nan Madol, the famous archaeological ruin off the southeast coast, and it was good for shorebirds in the ruins. There were forty Ruddy Turnstones on one set of ruins, and one Black-naped Tern, plus a Whimbrel--we saw one on every island. At the end of the kayak trip we hiked to Kepirohi waterfall, up the valley behind the PATS campus, encountering the Pohnpei Flycatcher for a few moments. It's a beautiful hike.

With a rented car we went all the way to the Pohnpei water cachement in Nanpil valley. You need four wheel drive to get all the way in. One pays a dollar to the gate keeper to walk past the Do Not Enter sign. We were looking for the elusive Micronesian Megapode, said to be here. We got into the steamiest, wettest, muddiest jungle possible, slipped around for a while, found a few natives harvesting the sakau plant which they use to get numb, but no megapodes. This began a six island search for this guy. Micronesians dig up their huge eggs from their compost pile-type nest, so the birds are scarce. Pohnpei Flycatchers, on the other hand, zipped all around our heads.

Up a parallel valley, lower down behind the Etscheit farms in Pohnpei town, on the edge of the area between "U" and "Nett" municipalities are the "Etscheit grasslands". Here we found lots of the Pohnpei race of the Gray White-eye, feeding in the grass, as well as several Caroline Islands White-eyes, one of several Pacific White-eyes who look much alike as they scramble through the trees. By following a "chick chick chick" sound in the tall grass, we also found the Caroline Islands Reed Warbler.

On Pohnpei they take airport departures so seriously that one must arrive not only two hours early, one has to go through security that early, then sit and wait two hours until the security procedure is repeated.
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Palau

One good thing that came from our friends' insistence that we stay in one of the most expensive hotels in Micronesia was that we got to bird the grounds. Actually, anyone could get away with walking in and birding as it's a very open place and the staff are friendly. It is at the end of the road on Arakabesan island, northwest of the two of Koror, connected by a causeway to the other central islands.

Exiting the hotel toward the road, down to the right, in a morning puddle we watched the supposedly hard to find Banded Crake take a leisurely bath. Others have reported him on the grounds; he may live here. Lots of Chestnut Mannikins were on the mowed grassy areas of the hotel.

Exiting the hotel toward the sea at the end of the hotel buildings on the right, a "nature trail" climbs up the hill into the forest. It is a hot, somewhat challenging hike, but we were rewarded near the top with good views of the endemic Palau Bush Warbler, usually hard to see we are told, but easier going up the hill because we were looking up underneath the bushes. Before we ever saw him, we heard his beautiful haunting song, long notes delivered at different pitches with pauses between. We did this hike twice and saw him both times. We also saw twice, at or near the top of the hill, a family of endemic Mangrove (Palau) Flycatchers, parents feeding kid, and the Dusky White-eye. Several fruit doves called but we never saw one here. We did get good views of the Palau Fantail, just as cute and hyperactive as other fantails we have known.

If one exits the hotel toward the sea and turns left, a short walk leads to the hotel boat dock and a kayak area. On a cement ramp beyond this--called the Japanese seaplane ramp--we saw the Common Sandpiper, Sanderlings, and a peep that may have been a winter Rufous-necked Stint. This area is a peninsula that sticks out into the sea, and might repay several visits.

From the elegance of the resort hotel we went to the Palau city dump, hot, smelly and disgusting. It is behind the Marina Hotel in Koror. Great birding, but our non-birding Palauan friends were quite nonplused by our visit. We asked ourselves, would Doug Pratt come to such a dreadful place? and the answer was, Yes!, so we kept on birding. There was one particularly disgusting small body of smelly green water surrounded by garbage. Here we saw juvenile Sharp-tailed Sandpipers, possibly a Swinhoe's Snipe, one Least Sandpiper, Marsh Sandpipers, one Little ringed Plover, and a dozen Pacific Golden Plovers, along with one plover that was very dark on the back and chest and larger and made us wonder, American golden? Nah.

Around the dry parts of the dump were a dozen or more Rufous Night Herons, a fearsome looking predator, Barn Swallows on the wires, twenty or more Intermediate Egrets, and several Cattle Egrets, Funny how one could puzzle over a single bird--Is it intermediate or cattle?--but when you see them together you wonder how you could ever have been confused.

On the water at the marina outside the hotel we saw one Common Black-headed Gull, and in the grass beyond the Marina hotel at the water's edge our first Yellow Bittern, a bird that turned out to be rather common in the islands. Even on Guam, where the tree snake has killed almost all the birds, there was a yellow bittern at the edge or our hotel grounds.

At the Hotel Nikko on Palau, with a great view of Rock Islands in close, we found Collared Kingfishers in the trees. These birds are different on each island, and we saw all, so let's hope splits are coming.

We arranged a kayak trip to the Rock Islands through Sam's Dive Shop. The tour was led by Ron Liedich, who is very knowledgeable about the sea animals and the plants, as well as the birds. The advantage to going out to the Rock Islands is that they are a nature preserve, largely undisturbed. We kayaked on or near Ngeruktabl island on inland ocean lakes, open sea, and mangrove forest where the trees make a tunnel over the shallow sea. Ron showed us giant Tridacna Clams three feet wide with iridescent purple, blue and gold flesh, Dragon Fish with killer stings, three foot long slimy worms and coral of every known color. The open sea here is bright aqua, and when the Bridled Terns flew over our kayaks their stomachs looked bright blue from the reflection of the sea. It was so beautiful that even if we had not seen a bird it would have been a great trip, but we saw many birds, and had the red and black Micronesian Honeyeater almost on our shoulders at lunch in the mangroves.

On the inland extensions of the sea, narrow valleys of water surrounded by nearly vertical green mountains, we saw a lot of birds. On Long Lake we had good looks at the Micronesian Pigeon, the Palau Fruit Dove, and the Nicobar Pigeon, a wonderful angry looking Giant Dove who has had his tail cut off about six inches too short. We got brief looks at the White- breasted Wood Swallow hovering over Long Lake, and the nondescript Morningbird dropping into green leaves. Sulfur- crested Cockatoos screamed overhead, and we heard but did not see the Eclectus Parrot. On Secret Lake, we also saw a Micronesian Kingfisher. We were told he wasn't supposed to be there, but maybe we weren't either.

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Yap

At 9:45 AM it is so blazing hot that we are using umbrellas to keep off the sun. Just outside our hotel we try to balance the umbrella while holding up our binoculars to see the birds in the papaya tree with the ripe fruit. In our first five minutes birding on Yap right down the street in front of the hotel we saw several life birds: first a Plain White-eye family, who were then kicked out by the larger Olive White-eye. Buzzing around them was a family of Rufous Fantails. On a wire overhead was a group of Eurasian Tree Sparrows, who turn out to be as common as dirt on Yap, saving us a trip to St. Louis.

Arching over the back of the town is the Nimar stone path, the old kind of road on Yap, which borders many prettily gardened homes and provides a view into Yapese life. The path starts by the Ocean View Hotel and ends behind the Bahai house on Chamorro Bay. The half that starts at the Ocean View is easy walking, but the second half after you cross a road is rocky and slippery. Just above the Bahai house, we saw the beautiful Yap Monarch, male and female. We looked all over Yap for the final flycatcher, the giant white eye, but never found it.

We had been told to check out the reservoir south of town toward the airport, so we asked if the hotel would drop us off there. No, but they would go with us there. Two guys took us in their truck/van. Their job was to explain to any passing Yapese what we were doing, as foreigners out on the road peering at the reservoir were questionable. We spent over an hour there--we're birders after all--and saw only one bird. The Yapese gentlemen thought we were nuts.

Trips to Yapese villages were more productive. We found Nutmeg Mannikins in the grass of Balabat village, and a Mongolian Plover in the dirt road near Gilman village at the southern end of the island. Both the villages are lovely. The large pond between the new road and the WWII airport--you can drive on the old runway--produced four White-browed Crake who divided up the area A female Greater Scaup swam around. There was a wrecked Japanese zero, the bane of the U.S. in WWII, on the edge of the pond. The village of Bechyal, in the north, has two semi-tame Red-footed Boobies who fly free, eat at sea, but roost in the front yard of a house where they were raised from infancy. We think they are the unusual white tailed brown morph. We and the boobies closely watched two Micronesian Honeyeaters fight a hard battle in the grass.

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Saipan

The Saipan version of the Collared Kingfisher is common. They like to sit on wires. Another bird commonly on the wires is the Philippine Turtle Dove, a nice looking introduced bird but not the dove we were looking for. We found Bridled White- eyes in our host's yard in the hills above San Vicente, but we also saw them all over. White-tailed Tropicbirds and Island Swiftlets are easy to see at the top of Mount Tapuchau, and you get a great view of the island. You can look from south to north from the mountain and trace the deadly battle of WWII. The Americans landed at the southern end and fought the heavily fortified, entrenched Japanese every inch up the island. As you bird the island you will run into many pillboxes, fortified caves and bunkers. Today the west coast of Saipan is a huge tourist mecca--dare one say, trap?--less elegant than Waikiki but nearly as crowded. Head for the relatively less developed parts, on the east and north of the island.

On the only road going north, toward the Marpi district, there is a dirt road off to the right, with a sign to the FEBC radio station. Up in the hills where this road takes a sharp left, near the station, we found Golden White-eyes, more vividly golden even than pictured in the book, a gorgeous bird. We heard but did not see the Mariana Fruit Doves. We had (barely) seen the other two fruit doves in Micronesia; would we get a glimpse of this one? Micronesian Honeyeaters, who are not common on Saipan, also live here. You can park and walk up the dirt road that goes off to the right, but don't drive it without a four wheel drive vehicle. It connects at the top to the paved road that goes to Suicide Cliff, where many Japanese jumped to avoid falling prisoner to Americans.

Also heading north toward Marpi one comes to the Fiesta shopping mall on the right. Just at the north end of the mall is a road to the right. Take that and wind up into the hills to the Laderan Tanki trail, marked on the left. (Where the paved road forks, go right.) Where the dirt road turns to the trailhead on the left in the grass on the right we found the Nightingale Reed Warbler, first singing deep in the grass but then popping up to a tree in the early morning light. On the trail we heard the Mariana Fruit Dove and the White-fronted Ground Dove, but as so often happened, we couldn't see them.

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Tinian

We took the Tinian Express boat from the docks near all the containers to go look for the Tinian Monarch. We caught the 10:00 AM boat, with a rental car waiting and return tickets for the 1:00 PM boat. You know the ad which shows the Taj Mahal with a bird sitting to the side, and the avid birder says, "Nice bird"? We seem to be in that category of birders because we only went to Tinian to see the monarch, making it a $100 bird. Rode over on the boat for an hour--no seabirds except Fairy Terns (White Terns)--and were met by the rental car agent. Signed up, got in the car, and drove up the dull, flat island for two miles, turned off onto a dirt road, parked, peered into the scrub, pished, and was then dressed down for several minutes at a distance of fifteen feet by an enraged Tinian Monarch. We had been on Tinian thirty-two minutes. We then drove to what is called "42nd street"--some joke, as there are no houses, no cars, no people, just millions of the scrub trees called tangen-tangen, or haole koa in Hawaii. Found more Tinian Monarchs, a family of them squabbling with white eyes and fantails. We watched them bicker over food until time to turn in the car and scoot back to Saipan on the Tinian Express.

Back on Saipan we went to one of the island's best shorebird spots, wetlands next to the Costco store and Wallace theaters. This is near the Toyota dealership just north of the road between Middle Road and Beach Road at the bottom of Middle Road. In several visits to this site, we saw over ten species of shorebirds including Pintails, Gargany, a Wood Sandpiper, who puts his head under water while feeding, and an unidentified Snipe. Twice while we were there White-breasted Ground Dove flew over, surprisingly high up. This was the only place we actually got to see this hard to view bird. During several of our visits, 50-60 Pacific Golden Plovers sat around on a grassy area next to Costco.

Another good wetland area we visited more than once is in the Kagman area, a peninsula sticking out to the east of Saipan. Take the "back" road that traverses east of Mt. Tapochau, turn off east into a paved road marked to Kagman. If it is not marked, it only goes east, is at the bottom of a curve from the southern and there is a very wide intersection. Wind down the road. At about one mile there is a paved road to the left. Take it and in about two hundred yards on the right is a dirt road angling off. Thirty yards up it, and down, are agricultural ponds. We always found good shorebirds here, among them the Marsh Sandpiper, a nervous feeder, a Greater Yellowlegs, and Least Sandpiper (or was it a Long-toed Stint?), lots of Pacific Golden Plovers and the Gray-tailed Tattler, plus another Snipe.

Saipan is overrun with the Eurasian Tree Sparrow. In the Kagman area we saw hundreds in a flock. Also on Saipan the Fish and Wildlife Service put out a "wanted dead or alive" poster for the Orange-cheeked Waxbill that was a growing threat to crops, but we didn't see the bird.

We made one last trip up to Marpi, at the north of the island, this time equipped with a tape of the bird's call, trying to find the megapode. We went to the "last command post" a WWII Japanese bunker with a memorial park now attached. To the right of the command post as you face it from the road there is a unmarked path that goes into the jungle. A few hundred yards in, in the dank gloom of a heavily forested jungle, we played the tape, and lo, thirty feet away in an area so dark we could only see him in silhouette, the Micronesian Megapode passed our way. We scored!

So, we quit and came home. We might have gone to Rota, between Guam and Saipan. We heard the Mariana fruit dove is easy to see there. Yeah, sure. We could have gone to Peliliu, south of Palau. We could have gone to Ant--good name--out of Pohnpei, to see clouds of sooty terns. We could have gone to Chuuk (Truk) to see their monarch. It was a great month long trip: the people were very friendly, the birds were lovely, and the scenery was great. We will go back.

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Thanks:

A number of people helped us in many ways, housing and feeding us, loaning us equipment,
driving us around, pointing or guiding us to the birding locations. This cooperation is one of the things that makes birding so enjoyable. Thanks very much to H. Douglas Pratt, Katrina Adams, Patti and Bob Arthur, Don Buden, Tina DeCruz, Marjorie Falenrhuw, Jerry and Irene Facey, John Fillmed, Jeff Foster, Josephine Giramur, Jaan Lepson, Ron Liedich, Annie Marshall, Dick May, Kurt Pohlman, Bob Pyle, Yoshi Screen, Lance Tanino and Gary Wiles.

Micronesian Bird List- Appendix to Nov. '01 Trip Report, Watson/Brown-Watson

Kosrae
Island Swiftlet Bird Cave
Pacific Golden Plover on beach outside Kosrae Village hotel (KV)
Wandering Tattler KV beach; possibly also, Siberian tattler
Black Noddy KV beach
Gray White-eye KV beach
Brown Noddy KV beach
Micronesian Starling KV grounds
Micronesian Honeyeater KV grounds
Great Crested Tern KV beach
Pacific Reef Heron both morphs KV beach
Fairy Tern KV beach
Ruddy Turnstone KV beach
Whimbrel in mangrove forest at southern end of island
Black Bellied Plover on dirt road interior of Utwa; turns off before Utwa
Blue-faced Parrotfinch "
Purple-crowned Fruit Dove "
Red Junglefowl all over on roads "
Pohnpei
Micronesian Honeyeater The Village hotel
Island Swiftlet "
White-tailed Tropicbird "
Pohnpei Lory "
Micronesian Starling "
Pohnpei Fantail "
Purple-capped Fruit Dove "
Moa "
Black Noddy "
Micronesian Kingfisher "
Fairy Tern En route to Nan Madol
Brown Booby "
Great-crested Tern "
Pacific Reef Heron Nan Madol
Ruddy Turnstone Nan Madol
Wandering Tattler Nan Madol
Pacific Golden Plover Nan Madol
Black-naped Tern From the water near PATS
Pohnpei Flycatcher Kepirohi Falls
Whimbrel Pohnpei
Grey White-eye Etscheit grasslands
Caroline Islands Reed Warbler "
Caroline Islands White-eye "
Huntstein's Mannikin possibly seen in downtown Kolonia
Palau
Pacific Golder Plover Palau Pacific Resort (PPR), Koror dump
Micronesian Honeyeater "
Pacific Reef Heron "
Micronesian Starling "
Dusky White-eye Resort Nature Trail
Island Swiftlet "
Mangrove Flycatcher "
Palau Bush Warbler ", Old Japanese Road (Nguraktabl)
Rufous Night Heron Koror dump
Barn Swallow "
Black Noddy PPR
Chestnut Mannikin PPR
Palau Fruit Dove Rock Islands kayak tour
Palau Fantail ", Old Japanese Road
Moa "
Snipe (Swinhoe's?) Koror Dump
Ruddy Turnstone
Sharp-tailed Sandpiper "
Wilson's Phalarope (?) "
Collared Kingfisher Hotel Nikko
Little Ringed Plover Koror dump
Banded Crake PPR driveway
White-tailed Tropicbird
Caroline Islands White-eye Old Japanese Road
Fairy Tern Rock Islands kayak tour
Micronesian Kingfisher Rock Islands kayak tour
Great Crested Tern "
Nicobar Pigeon "
Brown Noddy "
Gray (Siberian) Tattler "
Bridled Tern "
Micronesian Kingfisher "
Sulphur-crested Cockatoo "
White-breasted Wood-Swallow "
Morningbird "
Common Sandpiper PPR boat dock & Babeldaop
Cattle Egret Koror Dump
Sanderling PPR boat dock
Rufous-necked Stint(?) PPR boat dock
Intermediate Egret Koror dump
Marsh Sandpiper Koror dump
American Golden Plover(?) Koror dump
Least Sandpiper(?) Koror Dump
Common Black-headed Gull Marina near Koror dump
Yellow Bittern "
Yap
Micronesian Honeyeater from Pathways hotel
Micronesian Starling "
Fairy Tern "
Plain White-eye in papaya tree near Pathways hotel
Olive White-eye "
Rufous Fantail "
Eurasian Tree Sparrow - downtown Colonia
Yap Monarch Nimar stone path near the Chamorro Bay
Pacific Golden Plover
Black-naped Tern Reservoir
Barn Swallow "
Yellow Bittern Kadai jungle
Ruddy Turnstone Kadai beach park
Pacific Reef Heron "
Whimbrel "
Gray Tattler " and Bechiyal
Red Junglefowl
Nutmeg Mannikin Balabat & Gilman
Intermediate Egret Road to Gilman
Common Sandpiper Near airport road
Mongolian Plover Road near Gilman
White-browed Crake pond at old airport
Greater Scaup "
Black Noddy Road to Bechiyal
Brown Noddy
Red-footed Booby (Pet, flies freely)
Great-crested Tern Bechiyal
Guam (in transit from Guam Hilton Hotel)
Yellow Bittern
Philippine Turtle Dove
Eurasian Tree Sparrow
Fairy Tern
Rock Dove
Saipan
Collared Kingfisher Facey Farms, above San Vicente
Rufous Fantail "
Fairy Tern "
Bridled White-eye "
Micronesian Starling "
Eurasian Tree Sparrow "
Island Swiftlets Mt. Tapochau
White-tailed Tropicbird "
Yellow Bittern "
Philippines Turtle Dove Widespread
Golden White-eye Dirt road near FEBC radio
Moa "
Micronesian Honeyeater "
White-throated Ground Dove Costco wetlands (in flight)
Tinian Monarch Couple of tangantangan areas near 42nd street
Pacific Reef Heron Costco wetlands
Northern Pintail "
Common Moorhen "
Nightingale Reed Warbler Entrance to Laderan Tanki trail
Whimbrel
Sharp-tailed Sandpiper
Mariana Fruit Dove Facey Farms (in flight)
Snipe Kagman agricultural ponds
Gray Tattler "
Intermediate Egret "
Wood Sandpiper " and Costco wetlands
Marsh Sandpiper " and Costco wetlands
Greater Yellowlegs "
Peep sp. (yellow legs - least, or long-toed stint?)
Micronesian Megapode Marpi behind Last Command Post
Garganey Costco wetlands

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The following two books are highly recommended if planning a trip to the Islands mentioned here.

The Birds of Hawaii and the Tropical Pacific by H.D. Pratt et al. is a great field guide with illustrations of all the endemic and indiginous species of the region, as well as many migrant species likely to be encountered.

The Lonely Planet - Travel Survival Kit - Micronesia by G. Bendure and N. Friary is a great all-round guide to the area with information on all aspects of visiting the Islands of Micronesia and is up to the usual high standard of all of its guides. Fully illustrated and with many useful maps, such as those shown in the text above,

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