White-rumped Shama on Kaua'i in the Hawaiian Islands

Back to Hawai'i! During our early summer trip to the islands, I had an opportunity to see quite a few new and different bird species. The native species were so decimated by the arrival of humans and invasive alien species that they are rarely seen, at least in urban areas where most tourists congregate. They tend to see instead a diverse group of tropical birds introduced from all over the world. The White-rumped Shama (Copsychus malabaricus) is no exception. It was introduced to Kaua'i in the early 1930s, and later to Oahu and Molokai.

The bird has been called the Shama Thrush in the past, but is said to be more closely related to the flycatcher family. They are native to southeast Asia. The species has a highly melodious song, and I hear them more often than I see them.

They like to hide in thick forest, but this particular individual did me the favor of hanging out in a tree next to the luau being held at our hotel in Kapa'a on the island of Kaua'i. Sure, I was taking pictures of our students all dressed up, and the dancers dancing, but I was rather easily distracted by this beautiful bird, too.

A Reasonably Polite Invader in Hawai'i: The Zebra Dove

There is a cooing sound that starts the day in the lowland towns  of the Hawaiian Islands. It doesn't take long to identify the singer: it's the Zebra Dove (Geopelia striata). Even if one misses their morning song, they'll make themselves known as you try eating in a park or outside diner. They are one of the most common birds seen in Hawai'i.

The Zebra Dove arrived at the islands in 1922 in a shipment from Singapore. They are native over a wide swath of southeast Asia. They quickly established populations on all the islands almost to the point a being a nuisance (but most of them have been polite to me!).

Photo by Mrs. Geotripper

As almost always happens, I took practically no pictures of the single most common bird I saw during my recent trip! The first two pictures are from an earlier journey on Oahu, the third is from Mrs. Geotripper from the Kona area, and the fourth (below) is a shot I took at Kona as well.

Black-necked Stilt at the Merced National Wildlife Refuge and a Hawaiian Cousin

I'm surprised to see that I haven't yet posted pictures of the Black-necked Stilt (Himantopus mexicanu) before. I see them often at the wildlife refuges in the Great Valley. They're also photogenic birds! With their long legs, they cast beautiful reflections in the water as they strut around, poking their beaks into the mud.

I guess it is the sheer richness of variety of the birds in our valley. I go to a refuge, collect a large number of images, and before I've posted them, I'm distracted by a different trip and images.

The Black-necked Stilts are common on the mainland, and their numbers seem secure for the time being. They depend on freshwater wetlands, so their populations could be threatened by habitat loss. They feed on small fish and insects in the shallow waters.

Thousands of years ago, a few stilts were blown off-course, and somehow survived a 2,000 mile journey to the Hawaiian Islands. In the isolation they found there, they evolved ever so slightly from their mainland cousins, and are now considered a subspecies called an ae'o. With their favored habitat being in short supply on the islands, their numbers are not large. There are only about 2,000 of them, few enough that they are considered highly endangered. I've been privileged to see them a few times on my visits to the islands. One of them is in the picture below.

Ae'o, the endangered Black-necked Stilt of Hawaii

Land of the Lost: The Nene of Hawai'i

For the first-time traveler to Hawai'i, a word about the birds. There are two groups of birds, the species native to the Hawaiian Islands, and the introduced, or invasive species. There are also two groups of birds, the ones you are likely to see during your trip, and the ones you won't. It's unfortunate, but the two lists are pretty much the same. The native birds of the islands are under assault, and most of them never were a good fit for urban environments where island visitors spend most of their time. The natives have been decimated by disease (often transmitted by mosquito, another island invasive), habitat loss, predation by rats, mongoose, and cats, hunting, and competition from non-native birds. The state bird of Hawai'i, the nene (Branta sandvicensis), is the most iconic example of a native that was almost driven to extinction. A close relative, the Giant Hawaiian Goose, once lived on the island, but is now extinct. I wrote about the nene a few months ago, and the following is an abridged version of that post.

Perhaps 500,000 years ago, a pregnant Canada Goose, or a small flock of geese took a wrong turn. A really wrong turn. Somehow, flying along the coast of North America, the leader maybe decided to take a short cut, and it went poorly. Soon the shoreline was lost to view, and for days, not a single bit of land could be seen. I can imagine the flock becoming smaller and smaller as the weaker members fell behind and were lost.  After days of nothing but ocean, an island came into view. The tired geese landed and began looking for food. None of the plants were particularly familiar, but some proved edible and a few of the geese survived. For all we know, some of them rested up and left for further journeys, but a few stayed around. They took up residence on the volcanic island in the tropics of the Pacific Ocean, a vastly different environment than their summer home in the Canadian Arctic. The isolated volcanic edifices are today called the Hawaiian Islands.

During the millennia that followed, different flocks of geese took up residence in different ecological niches, such as lava flows, grassy slopes, and woodlands. Isolated groups began to diverge, and before long at least three species developed on the islands. One of them, the Giant Hawaiian Goose (species name not yet established), was big, almost four feet long. A lack of predators on the island made flight an energy-intensive but unneeded luxury, so the wings became smaller as the bird evolved to larger size. The goose was flightless. This worked fine for a long time, but humans ultimately arrived on the islands, and probably exterminated them, either by hunting, or by introduction of egg-eating rats, or by habitat destruction.

The second species was the nene-nui (Branta hylobadistes). It was also a big bird, but had larger wings so that it was still capable of weak flight. Like the Giant Hawaiian Goose, it became extinct soon after the arrival of humans on the islands. It has been characterized as a bird in evolutionary transition, in the midst of losing the ability to fly, but it went extinct first. Possibly because it couldn't fly well.

I didn't mean that as a flippant remark. Evolution is a process that has provided the incredible diversity on our planet, and isolated islands have provided the crucible in which much of the planet's diversity has arisen. But birds and other animals that have adapted to very specific situations are vulnerable when those situations are changed. The two extinct Hawaiian geese species were secure on the Hawaiian Islands, but the arrival of humans changed their environment too much and too fast. They were certainly easier to capture than a bird that could escape by flying.

The flying goose, the one that survived was the nene (Branta sandvicensis). The nene's wings were smaller than its Canadian ancestors, because it didn't need to migrate thousands of miles during the change of seasons. But it retained enough flying ability to escape from the island's human invaders. It differed from the Canada Goose in several other respects, including longer legs, reduced webbing between its toes, and a more erect posture. It is adapted to living on lava flows and grasslands, and was less dependent on wetlands than other geese.

It survived, but no longer thrived. Rats ate their eggs and chicks, and later on cats and mongooses were brought to the islands. The species was devastated, dropping from an estimated 25,000 when first European contact was made in 1778 to thirty individuals in 1952. A captive breeding program began, and populations were established on their ancient habitats on Maui and Kauai (where mongooses were never introduced). The wild population is now around 1,950 with another thousand or so in captivity. They are still highly endangered, but their prospects are slowly improving. They have been named the state bird of Hawaii.

I've seen the nenes (pronounced "nay-nay") on Maui at Hosner Grove (the top picture), and on the flank of Kiluaea in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park on the Big Island (the other two pictures). It is awe-inspiring to observe the descendants of a few very unlucky Canada Geese (or lucky?) who made a wrong turn 500,000 years ago and survived a terrifying journey over a very large ocean. I'm glad we're trying to help them survive, instead of driving them to extinction.

Are you interested in learning a bit more about these fascinating creatures? Here is a link for a National Geographic article on the evolution of the Hawaiian geese and their Canadian cousins, and the scholarly article of the research into the vanished species:

 http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/02/0206_020206_canadiangeese.html

 http://www.pnas.org/content/99/3/1399.full

Land of the Lost, the Birds of Hawaii: A Blog Series

Hawai'i is one of the most isolated landmasses on planet Earth. Surrounded by thousands of miles of open water, it's kind of amazing that any animals or plants thrive there at all. Instead, the islands have an incredibly diverse and complex ecosystem. Most of the endemic species in the United States occur on these small islands (endemic species are those that are found nowhere else in the world) . When plants and insects are included, the number of species are in the thousands.

How did all these species get here? The answer is...strange. They didn't all get here. A few of them got here, and the survivors changed and evolved into new species better adapted to the new environment they faced on the islands. Hawaii as a laboratory for evolution is in many ways the equal of the more famous (to biologists and geologists) Galapagos Islands.

Hawaii truly is the land of the lost. The animals that reached these islands prior to human colonization were blown off course and somehow survived a harrowing journey of several thousand miles over the unforgiving sea. Millions of birds of birds have become lost over the oceans through the endless years, and only a vanishingly small percentage are ever lucky enough to make landfall. The rest perish. By one estimate I've seen, a new bird species arrives by natural processes only once every 20,000 years.

The birds of Hawai'i were one of the nicest discoveries of my six visits to the islands. I can point to my Hawaiian experiences as the beginning of my interest in birding. I find their stories to be fascinating, and I am looking forward to seeking them out again. I'll have a chance (and so will you) next summer, as we will be offering a field studies course on the islands from June 1-14, 2016. To celebrate the coming trip (and I guess to celebrate one year of bird blogging), I'm going to be offering a series of posts on the birds of Hawaii, both the native species and some of the interesting invaders as well.

It being my habit to be easily distracted, the series will be off and on as I get the time. I hope you'll enjoy! Aloha!

Bird of the Day: What Happens if a Canada Goose goes on a Tropical Vacation? nene!

Perhaps 500,000 years ago, a pregnant Canada Goose, or a small flock of geese took a wrong turn. A really wrong turn. Somehow, flying along the coast of North America, the leader maybe decided to take a short cut, and it went poorly. Soon the shoreline was lost to view, and for days, not a single bit of land could be seen. I can imagine the flock becoming smaller and smaller as the weaker members fell behind and were lost.  After days of nothing but ocean, an island came into view. The tired geese landed and began looking for food. None of the plants were particularly familiar, but some proved edible and a few of the geese survived. For all we know, some of them rested up and left for further journeys, but a few stayed around. They took up residence on the volcanic island in the tropics of the Pacific Ocean, a vastly different environment than their summer home in the Canadian Arctic. The isolated volcanic edifices are today called the Hawaiian Islands.

During the millennia that followed, different flocks of geese took up residence in different ecological niches, such as lava flows, grassy slopes, and woodlands. Isolated groups began to diverge, and before long at least three species developed on the islands. One of them, the Giant Hawaiian Goose (species name not yet established), was big, almost four feet long. A lack of predators on the island made flight an energy-intensive but unneeded luxury, so the wings became smaller as the bird evolved to larger size. The goose was flightless. This worked fine for a long time, but humans ultimately arrived on the islands, and probably exterminated them, either by hunting, or by introduction of egg-eating rats, or by habitat destruction.

The second species was the nene-nui (Branta hylobadistes). It was also a big bird, but had larger wings so that it was still capable of weak flight. Like the Giant Hawaiian Goose, it became extinct soon after the arrival of humans on the islands. It has been characterized as a bird in evolutionary transition, in the midst of losing the ability to fly, but it went extinct first. Possibly because it couldn't fly well.

I didn't mean that as a flippant remark. Evolution is a process that has provided the incredible diversity on our planet, and isolated islands have provided the crucible in which much of the planet's diversity has arisen. But birds and other animals that have adapted to very specific situations are vulnerable when those situations are changed. The two extinct Hawaiian geese species were secure on the Hawaiian Islands, but the arrival of humans changed their environment too much and too fast. They were certainly easier to capture than a bird that could escape by flying.

The flying goose, the one that survived was the nene (Branta sandvicensis). The nene's wings were smaller than its Canadian ancestors, because it didn't need to migrate thousands of miles during the change of seasons. But it retained enough flying ability to escape from the island's human invaders. It differed from the Canada Goose in several other respects, including longer legs, reduced webbing between its toes, and a more erect posture. It is adapted to living on lava flows and grasslands, and was less dependent on wetlands than other geese.

It survived, but no longer thrived. Rats ate their eggs and chicks, and later on cats and mongooses were brought to the islands. The species was devastated, dropping from an estimated 25,000 when first European contact was made in 1778 to thirty individuals in 1952. A captive breeding program began, and populations were established on their ancient habitats on Maui and Kauai (where mongooses were never introduced). The wild population is now around 800, with another thousand or so in captivity. They are still highly endangered, but their prospects are slowly improving. They have been named the state bird of Hawaii.

My travels in Hawaii were part of the inspiration for my new-found love of bird watching and bird photography. I've seen the nenes (pronounced "nay-nay") on Maui at Hosner Grove (the top picture), and on the flank of Kiluaea in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park on the Big Island (the other two pictures). It is awe-inspiring to observe the descendants of a few very unlucky Canada Geese (or lucky?) who made a wrong turn 500,000 years ago and survived a terrifying journey over a very large ocean. I'm glad we're trying to help them survive, instead of driving them to extinction.

Are you interested in learning a bit more about these fascinating creatures? Here is a link for a National Geographic article on the evolution of the Hawaiian geese and their Canadian cousins, and the scholarly article of the research into the vanished species:

 http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/02/0206_020206_canadiangeese.html

 http://www.pnas.org/content/99/3/1399.full