January 2007
Alanna L.

 

I travelled to Aruba on Jan. 6-13th of 2007.  While I didn't do any serious birdwatching,

I took pictures of the birds I came across at the hotels and beaches.

Tropical Mockingbird

I saw a few tropical mockingbirds at the beach at the Marriott Hotel, as well as one at the Alto Vista Chapel.

Carib Grackle

Carib Grackles were seen in the sand on the hotel beaches.

Male House Sparrow

I saw house sparrows along the beaches in the high rise hotel area.

  

Magnificent Frigatebird

I saw these beautiful birds soaring above the shore in the high rise hotel area.  I took a short walk from the Marriott beach to the sailing area, where I saw these birds flying above me. 

I think these are some kind of sandpipers. 

As I walked the beach to the sailing area, I noticed a wet area in the bush behind the beach. 

Here I saw the sandpipers, and I also saw a Carib Grackle.

Eared Dove

I saw many of these walking along the beaches in the high rise hotel area.  They would often come up fairly close.  They reminded me of the mourning doves that I see in my yard.  I didn't know what they were called until the end of my trip, so I just called them mourning doves the whole time.  I also saw them at the Hyatt Regency Hotel.  There they have two macaws in a cage.  The eared doves would fly between the bars of the cage, and take the macaws' food, and then fly back out of the cage.

Ruddy Turnstone

I saw a few of these birds along the beach at the Holiday Inn, however, they were not as frequent visitors as the eared doves or house sparrows.

 

Laughing Gulls

These can be seen everywhere along the shoreline.  In there particular pictures, I was on the glass bottom boat.  The gulls were hovering around a snorkelling boat at the Antilla shipwreck.  The captain of the glass bottom boat, gave us old bagels to feed the fish, however, the laughing gulls, would fight for the food as well.

   

Brown Pelican

No visit to Aruba would be complete without watching the brown pelicans.  One of the most enjoyable experiences of my trip was watching these birds soar through the sky and dive for fish.  Unfortunately, I was unable to get a picture of them diving.  Usually with the delay on my camera, I would only catch the splash in the water.  I saw these birds everywhere along the beaches, but there were more of them at Eagle Beach , where these pictures were taken.

Brown Booby

I also saw a few brown boobies at Eagle Beach .  I guess the ones I saw were immature because they were all solid brown, and I didn't see any with white patches.

There were also some other birds that I saw throughout my trip that I was unable to get a good picture of:

Caribbean Parakeet-I saw two of these fly across the road in the Alto Vista Chapel Area

Bananaquit-I saw one land in a bush at the Holiday Inn but I was not fast enough with the camera

Troupial-I saw a couple of these by the Alto Vista Chapel, and I also saw one at the Holiday Inn beach, landed at the top of a tall tree

Snowy Egret-I would see one of these in the swamp at Bubali everytime I would drive by on the highway