Antigua - the Good, the Bad and the Birds.

It was mid-December, in southwestern BC, and I was itching to get out of the relentless rain. Something new was in the works – 10 days at a resort in Antigua.

Antigua is one of two Caribbean Islands that comprise the nation of Antigua & Barbuda known for its aqua-colored waters, coral reefs and white sand beaches. We would be staying at Hammock Cove, a beautiful, all-inclusive, luxurious and remote resort, ideal for kicking back, sunbathing, reading and perhaps the occasional gin and tonic.

Breakfast on our patio at Hammock Cove, Antigua

Sounds great but will I see some birds?

A quick Google search revealed that Antigua has a respectable 204 bird species of which 5 were introduced, 132 are “accidental or rare”, and 67 that call Antigua “home”. OK, I’ll bring a camera and binoculars.

Hammock Cove Resort– is on the northeast coast, right next to a dry dusty windswept peninsula constantly pounded by Atlantic waves. These waves have created “The Devil’s Bridge”, a limestone arch spanning the frothy turbulent sea. Quite impressive in a “power of nature” kind of way and it’s a tourist hot spot. You can walk over the bridge, but rogue waves continue to kill people, so we decided to pass!*

Our room was beautiful and overlooked the peninsula. It was an ideal spot for a morning breakfast or a sunset libation. But the coastline was wave-pounded and very rocky, leaving few areas for shore birds to hang out.

Undeterred, your intrepid birder sat, camera at the ready, perched over coffee on the balcony. A few birds did show up – notably the ubiquitous bananaquit, the Antillian bullfinch and the Carib grackle, who between them fill that “scrounging sparrow/crow” niche very adequately.

A couple of egrets wandered by once for a photoshoot, pelicans would drift overhead, Zenaida Doves scavenged in the bush and an Osprey was seen in the distance, hauling a good-sized fish out of the nearby reef. Hmmph, typical osprey, (see Hey that’s my fish!, to understand my love/hate relationship with these birds).

If I wanted to hit pay-dirt, so to speak, I would have to venture out of my luxurious nest to locate the local fauna.

Morning walks through the local brush grudgingly yielded a few hummingbirds, grey kingbirds, a Mangrove cuckoo, (rare-ish, so a bit of a coup!), an American Kestrel, or “chickenhawk”, and a very brief flash of yellow – likely a Yellow warbler. But to find much more would require help and transportation.

Shannon discovered and emailed – Pelican Tours – and a day of birding was soon arranged.

Time to get out and see the Island!

Three days later, at 6:45 am, I hooked up with Almond Peters, or “AP”, from Pelican Tours, and away we went in an ancient, but perfectly adequate Nissan 4 x 4 – a “Nissan Antigua”, perhaps?

The first stop was the Potworks Dam, which was constructed to supply fresh water to the island.

Antigua is a small island measuring 281 sq kms, with an 87 km coastline. The annual average rainfall is only 100 cm, so it’s not a desert but has less rainfall than many Caribbean Islands, (eg 200 cm in Jamaica), and with a 90,000 + population it has severe water shortage problems. Potworks and other dams, plus local wells and more recently, five reverse osmosis water plants, have been built to provide fresh water to the Antigua.

When low, Potworks Dam provides shallow areas ideal for waders and shore birds. Unfortunately, it was high due to recent rain which doesn’t favour shorebirds, although we still saw a green heron hiding in the bushes, a few brown pelicans and in the far distance we could see many egrets, herons and ducks – either black-bellied whistling-ducks, the West Indian whistling duck or the fulvous whistling duck – it seems Antiguan ducks like to whistle! Honestly, they were too far away to be sure which.

Next, we visited the Sherkeley Mountains. This is a natural rain forest, with a number of peaks, the highest, at 402 metres, was named Mount Obama for a while, obviously honouring a recent US president, but is now changed to Boggy peak. it’s very green and lush and happily it is a protected area with many trails. Antigua Rainforest Zipline Tours – Zipline tours – are located here.

Birds are numerous in this area but tough to see. It would require an early morning start, with good birding “ears” and lots of patience to find birds here. Maybe next time.

Then onto Ffryes Beach where a belted kingfisher showed up. I see these guys regularly in BC, and it was odd to see an old friend in Antigua. Yup, they live here too, they look identical to the ones I’m familiar with and just like home, they spook easily, flying away as soon as they’re spotted. Ffryes Beach is a beautiful bay and a nearby lagoon also yielded sightings of blue, great blue and tricoloured herons, egrets and more.

Nearby Pelican Island is a rookery, for pelicans obviously, and there was a constant string of pelicans diving for food. Again, a beautiful bay, (no shortage of these in Antigua), which features a large luxury resort. A look around the bushes behind the beach yielded finches, a hummingbird and lizards. We were looking for warblers, but no luck.

FFrom here we headed to Runaway Bay and Mckinnon’s Salt Pond. This natural lagoon area is a short drive north of St John’s in the northwest and it’s the most productive birding area in Antigua. And it didn’t disappoint. There was a wide variety of herons, egrets, stilts, ducks and pelicans, plus smaller birds in the bushes. In fact, 113 species have been recorded here according to the Mckinnon salt pond bird count – and we spent quite a while in this area, moving to different spots around the lagoon. Here is where my best photos came from. It is a perfect spot for shorebirds and more.

Alas, all is not well in Camelot

But Antigua has a big problem. A garbage problem. After a quick look around, the local and political disregard for this gem of nature was sadly apparent.

A road along the northwestern seaside isolated a large portion of the pond, raising sea levels enough to kill off huge swathes of mangroves; a second dirt causeway, to run fuel lines from an offshore oil facility to a refinery nearby, was built right through the centre of the pond, creating an ugly eyesore and isolating the southern part of the pond from the sea; meanwhile, private and resort developments are indiscriminately removing large mangrove areas; and, as a final insult, some locals have decided it is an ideal spot for fly tipping, (dumping personal waste), so, while looking for birds, I walked past old computer monitors, “wait, isn’t that an old Samsung LED screen?!”, old bed frames, miscellaneous chunks of metal from old bikes, huge amounts of polystyrene and discarded plastic in all its shapes and forms. Birding can be a challenge as you try to avoid being impaled!

Unfortunately, Antigua hasn’t yet developed a recycling service for plastics, ergo the ubiquitous plastic litter and bottles, and garbage disposal is also an issue on an island struggling with a burgeoning population. But I think a lot of this litter could be cleared with some community effort – better vigilance, some garbage bins, volunteer groups, school kids on a Friday afternoon?

Heading back to the hotel, we discussed life in Antigua generally, including the fact that my guide, an avid birder and naturalist, finds these problems very vexing. But it’s clear that nature lovers like him are an exception on this Island and they lack political clout. Another decade of mismanagement will only make this worse. For now, a beautiful area still exists here. There is good diversity so I saw many different species. But I also saw tourists, off a cruise ship I think, doing some horse trekking past all that garbage. They’re not blind and neither am I. Surely, with TLC and planning, it should be possible to look after the Mckinnon salt pond and other sensitive areas better.

“C’mon Antigua, smarten up!”

It feels wrong to write negative things in a blog, the temptation being to do a “travel blog whitewash” and I feel compelled to add that I had a wonderful day and I highly recommend this Pelican Safaris trip for interested birders. Almond is a knowledgeable guide and a fun guy to spend a day with.

As we were pulling up to the hotel, there it was in the bushes right next to the road. A yellow warbler, who bounced around for 2 or 3 minutes before moving away. A perfect end to a fun day.

For further reading, I discovered a fascinating discussion of these islands THE BLUE ECONOMIC CONTEXT OF ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA which discusses the inefficient management of waste and the need to adopt sustainable practices to protect the environment of this unique and beautiful island nation.