In Seychelles (and doubtless elsewhere) hotels, ranging from small guest houses to huge five-star buildings catering for those who want luxury, have been built in areas with bird populations that form part of the attraction for many of the guests. In warmer climes, the restaurants associated with the hotels are open plan, often with outside … More Birds and restaurants
As mentioned in the post of 9 June, Sooty Terns began nesting early in 2019, but it had been thought that the earliest eggs, laid around 10 May, had been deserted. Our discovery yesterday (13 June) of the first 2019 chick shows that some of those mid-May eggs did survive and that this year’s hatch … More The first of the many
When Bird Island was first discovered by Europeans in the 1770s, it was described as being covered by “innumerable” birds and later visitors reaffirmed this, also mentioning scant vegetation. The discoverers did not name the birds they found but Sooty Terns were likely to have been the most numerous species. Other species, mainly ground nesting … More Bird Island is not just for Sooty Terns!
During an evening search for ringed Sooty Terns in the Bird Island colony on 8 June, the youngest member of our team, Dylan Savy, found an incubating adult with its tongue extending below the lower mandible, having pierced the skin and other tissues in the bottom of the mouth. This condition is called a sub-lingual … More A rare and strange condition found in a Sooty Tern
Between May and September Bird Island, Seychelles, hosts the world’s largest Sooty Tern colony that is readily accessible to tourists (there are a few larger breeding colonies of Sooty Terns in the Indian and Pacific Oceans but they are on islands that are not open to tourists). The approximate half a million pairs that breed … More New visitor facilities on Bird Island
Less than one kilometre off the south-eastern coast of Mauritius, near Mahebourg, lies a small (27 ha), low lying coralline island, Ile aux Aigrettes. Like so much of Mauritius, it had been devastated by man’s activities – deforestation and the introduction of invasive species of plants and animals, leading to a loss of most of … More Ile aux Aigrettes: conserving Mauritius’s endemic wildlife
A bugle-like monotone sound permeates the early morning air of the local village street. The repeated sound emanates from a large conch shell with a hole pierced through the shell wall and can be heard for hundreds of metres from the source. Obeying the laws of physics, the volume of the sound increases as the … More A Seychelles tradition survives with fisherman John
Originally posted on Wild Bird Conservation:
? ? On Saturday 4 November my book “Orange Omelettes and Dusky Wanderers” was launched in my local town, Haslemere. Haslemere Bookshop hosted an afternoon brief talk and signing. At the well-attended event I explained the background to my studies of Sooty Terns in Seychelles, initiated through concern over…
During my youth birdwatching in the late 1950s and 1960s, my most important book was “A field guide to the birds of Britain and Europe”, by Roger Tory Peterson, Guy Mountford and P.A.D. Hollom (commonly referred to as the “Peterson field guide”. At the time this was the gold standard of identification guides, bought for … More Childhood birdwatching dreams
Since human settlement of the Seychelles archipelago about two-and-a-half centuries ago, most of the granitic islands that form the main island group have been substantially modified by man’s activities. At about 280 hectares, Curieuse is the fifth largest of the granitic islands and, like most of the others, it was formerly forested. Among the trees … More Curieuse Island
