April 13, 2018--Keauhou, HI--So the bird trip has begun.  Our first stop yesterday was at the sewer treatment plants for shorebirds and waterfowl.  In addition, we picked up some land birds as well.  On our walk out to the plant we heard the distinct call of a Black Francolin but we were never able to locate where he was calling from.  Besides the usual zebra dove and house sparrows we quickly located a number of black-crowned night herons.  They were sitting on the fence and along the banks of the settlement ponds.  There were also many ruddy turnstones, sanderling and the bonus Hawaii

Black-crowned Night Heron 

Heron in flight

species I have seen here in spring and fall, wandering tattler.  Tbere were other shorebirds which

Wandering tattler

I did not take a picture of at the ponds--sanderling and ruddy turnstone, as well as the ever present house sparrow and zebra dove.  We did observe a francolin pair fly off but could not be sure of their identity.  There were lesser scaup, northern shouveler, mallard, and Hawaiian coots a plenty.  We did have a least tern and a laughing gull, the only gull I have seen on the island.  In all we left the ponds with a list of 23 species.

From the ponds we headed up into the cloud forest to spend some time at Mike and Jenny Myers, new friends we have made here in Kona.  They live at 4700 feet up the mountain.  Here we were able to find several species which inhabit the higher altitudes--apapane, amakihi, japanese bush warbler, and kalij pheasant.  In addition, we were able to hike around the 2 acre plot and observe the many trees and plants that provide the habitat for these birds.

apapane

saffon finch

amakihi

We then headed back to the condo to rest before heading to Honokahou harbor for some late afternoon birding and watch the sunset.  There we found sanderling, wandering tattler, Hawaiian coot, and beautiful pacific golden plover.  From the picture you can see why they are called "golden".

pacific golden plover

Hawaiian coot

spotted dove

sunset

I was also able to the the above picture of a spotted dove with a very nice background.

Today we headed up to the Palila Trail on Mona Kea.  We were not disapponinted.  We foud our target bird the Palila as well as looks a more amakihi, an elapiao, japanese bush warbler and a quick look at a red-billed leiothrix.

palilia

Then on our way down we traveled Old Saddle Road and wer able to see the Pueo (Hawaiian short-eared owl).  

pueo

From there we travelled to the Waipie Valley, a beautiful scenic loaction to show our guest.  Then through a terrible lightening and heavy rain storm we drove to Waimei for some local ice cream, then headed home.  It is late as I write this so I am not going to check it for errors.  We have to leave here in the morning at 5:30 to get to our pelagic trip in the morning.