The following report is for a trip made by David W. Nelson, Matthew Matthiessen and myself to Jamaica for 5 days of birding April 20 to April 25, 2012. Our goal was to see all of the Jamaican endemics and as many of the Caribbean endemics as possible.
Logistics and Transportation
As David and Matthew were flying in from California, they both took red-eye flights from California to Miami and then early morning flights into Montego Bay, Jamaica on Friday April 20. I flew in from Detroit with a short layover in Atlanta meeting the guys in Montego Bay at about 11am. Everyone passed customs without any issues. I had a slight detour to the Health Desk as I had been in Costa Rica (a malarial country) 2 weeks prior to arriving in Jamaica. They asked me a few questions about how long I was in CR and if I was feeling ill. They provided me with a contact number incase I should become ill while in Jamaica and wished me well.
As David and Matthew arrived before me they had already done the paperwork for the rental car and were waiting for me outside the airport. In retrospect to where most of the birds were found we probably should have flown into Kingston instead of Montego Bay but flight times and costs steered us to Montego Bay. The other issue with flying to Montego Bay was the airport did not have a place to rent a cell phone or a Jamaican SIM card for one of our US phones. I think we could have gone to AllCell and rented one but we chose to go without and it didn’t cause any major headaches until the last night when we changed our hotel plans and had to find something in Montego Bay.
Our rental car, a Toyota Rav4 2 wheel drive, was through Avis primarily because they offered GPS. The GPS in my opinion was a god send. Matthew, who did all the driving since he had lived in a left hand drive country, may beg to differ. On numerous occasions the GPS would get “lost” and make errant turns or tell us to turn where there weren’t roads. This tended to occur in towns more than in the country but it did cause more than a little frustration. That being said, we didn’t find a good map in the US or in Jamaica so trying to navigate with only a map would have been extremely difficult. The biggest error on the part of the GPS was when we tried to go from Manchioneal to Hardwar Gap. The GPS routed us back north then south on the A3 then up Norbrook to Woodford Dr. This seemed out of the way but the Lonely Planet guide we had also mentioned the B1 between Charles Town and Hardwar Gap had been closed due to a landslide. There are 2 lessons to be learned here: 1 per the locals at the Starlight Hotel the B1 is open between Hardwar gap and Charles Town and 2). Norbrook to Woodford Dr is an extremely curvy road that turns into a 2 track path the higher you get into the mountain. It was raining fairly hard the day we tried it and the erosion and water coming down the path made us turn back about 15 kilometers short of reaching the B1 turning what should have been a 3 hour drive into a 7.5 hour odyssey
Money
For the most part everywhere we went would take USD. The exchange rate we got was about 84 JAD to 1 USD. I think the official rate was 88 to 1. The biggest issue we had in doing this was having large denominated US currency and the store not having enough money to give change back in JAD. I tried using 2 of my ATM cards at a Royal Bank of Canada ATM in Montego Bay but both were denied for some reason. My suggestion would be to convert some money at the airport or bring a lot of 10s and 20s in USD.
Food
For the most part we ate on the go, Kentucky Fried Chicken, fruit from a local grocery, oatmeal, Poptarts or PB&J. Hotel Jamaican Colors in Manchioneal and Holiday Inn Resort Hotel in Montego Bay provided our only other hot meals. This wasn’t a culinary tour….
Resources
- Previous trip reports found on Surfbirds
- “Birds of the West Indies” by Herbert Raffaele
- “A Photographic Guide to the Birds of Jamaica” by Ann Haynes-Sutton. Matthew found this book right before we left and it is great. It is a photographic guide and it looks like the birds were photographed in the zoo the lighting is so good and the subjects so close. The Jamaican island range map was very useful as was the additional habitat and behavior information. David and I bought copies from Ann and we all asked her to sign our copy which she graciously obliged.
- Audio recording – “Bird Songs in Jamaica” record by George Reynard
Day 1
After getting the rental car and stopping at a grocery for some staples we were on our way east on the coast highway to Manchioneal from Montego Bay. The drive was fairly uneventful with sightings of the ever present Gray and Loggerhead Kingbirds. A few hours into the drive we stopped near a large weedy field to stretch our legs and had good looks at Antillean Palm Swift, White collared Swift and good numbers of Black Swift. Back in the car our next stop was Hotel Mockingbird Hill where we saw our first endemics. Vervain Hummingbird, Black billed Streamertail, Jamaican Woodpecker, Jamaican Spindalis and Jamaican Oriole were all seen from the parking area. We also had point blank views of a male Black-throated Blue Warbler, highlighting Jamaica as a wintering ground for North American Warblers. It was getting late so we continued on our way to Manchioneal where we stayed at Hotel Jamaican Color. It is a small hotel run by a family of French expats. We got a small cabana type room that had 3 beds, with mosquito netting, and Tile floors. We learned later that tile flooring is cleaner and does not smell of mold, like some other locations with carpeting. The place was well kept but simple, no TV, hot water or A/C. It was warm but not hot and we all ended up getting an ok nights sleep despite the deafening chorus of frogs that seemed ever present throughout the island.
Species Seen (sorry the taxonomical order is jumbled due to the way I filtered in Excel)
Brown Pelican
Magnificent Frigatebird
Great Blue Heron
Great Egret
Little Blue Heron
Snowy Egret
Cattle Egret
Yellow-crowned Night-Heron
White Ibis
Blue-winged Teal
Turkey Vulture
American Kestrel
Common Moorhen
Black-necked Stilt
Royal Tern
Rock Pigeon
White-crowned Pigeon
Zenaida Dove
White-winged Dove
Smooth-billed Ani
Black Swift
White-collared Swift
Antillean Palm-Swift
Gray Kingbird
Loggerhead Kingbird
Tree Swallow
Barn Swallow
Northern Mockingbird
Greater Antillean Grackle
Black-billed Streamertail
Vervain Hummingbird
Jamaican Woodpecker
Northern Parula
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Palm Warbler
American Redstart
Bananaquit
Jamaican Spindalis
Jamaican Oriole
Day 2
Up at 5:30 we drove to Eccelsdown Rd excited about getting into some good mountain habitat. We turned on to Eccelsdown and started working our way North/West toward Reach. We were pretty disappointed with the habitat (palm farms and houses) and were wondering if we were in the right place. We decided to keep going and finally came to a sign for John Crow Mts Park. We parked off the road and walked a little finding a Jamaican Pewee on the electric wire by the road. Not much else was seen and we quickly ventured on still not sure if we were in the correct place. The road started up the mountain and we came to a place where a 2 track road came in from the left. There was a wide spot so we parked and began to walk around. We quickly found Jamaican and Chestnut bellied Cuckoo, Rufous tailed Flycatcher and Orangequit. David took the opportunity to get some up close photos of the Chestnut bellied Cuckoo while Matthew and I continued up the road. About half a mile further Matthew brought my attention to a black bird picking through some dead leaves high up in a tree – Jamaican Blackbird! The bird left and we knew this wasn’t going to sit well with David who was still back photographing the Cuckoo. We spent a little more time here finding Jamaican Tody and Euphonia before heading back to the car. While Matthew and I were doing this, David photographed the Jamaican Euphonia and Yellow-faced Grassquit.
Once back at the car we continued up the road about a mile and when we came around a corner there was a Crested Quail Dove in the road almost at the next curve. We crept along and had ok looks before the bird took flight around the corner. Continuing up the hill, we came to a driveway that angled into the road at a 45 degree angle on the right. We serendipitously parked at this location and continued to walk along the road. I draw attention to this location because over the course of the day and the next morning we had 20 of the islands endemics a few hundred yards downhill (north of this driveway). We continued driving and stopping, where we could pull off, for the remainder of the day totaling a nice list of species. Towards the end of the day we stopped at a decaying palm farm where the tops of all the trees had broken off. We were hoping for a Potoo but it wasn’t to be. We did see a group of 4-5 nighthawks fly by but since they weren’t calling we couldn’t be sure if they were Antillean or Common. We did find out from Ann Sutton later in the trip that these were likely Antillean Nightwawks, since the Common Nighthawks rarely flew in flocks. We then drove back to Hotel Jamaican Colors for a dinner of pizza and my nightly cigar. The hotel owners when asked described seeing Barn Owls fairly regularly so I was hopeful I would see one. I walked the entry road but heard nothing but frogs.
Species Seen (sorry the taxonomical order is jumbled due to the way I filtered in Excel)
Cattle Egret
Turkey Vulture
Red-tailed Hawk
American Kestrel
White-crowned Pigeon
Ring-tailed Pigeon
Zenaida Dove
Common Ground-Dove
Crested Quail-Dove
Olive-throated Parakeet
Green-rumped Parrotlet
Yellow-billed Parrot
Jamaican Lizard-Cuckoo
Chestnut-bellied Cuckoo
Smooth-billed Ani
Antillean Nighthawk
Black Swift
Jamaican Mango
Black-billed Streamertail
Jamaican Tody
Jamaican Woodpecker
Jamaican Pewee
Sad Flycatcher
Rufous-tailed Flycatcher
Gray Kingbird
Loggerhead Kingbird
Cave Swallow
Northern Mockingbird
White-eyed Thrush
White-chinned Thrush
Jamaican Crow
Jamaican Vireo
Blue Mountain Vireo
Black-whiskered Vireo
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Arrow-headed Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Ovenbird
Common Yellowthroat
Bananaquit
Jamaican Spindalis
Jamaican Euphonia
Yellow-faced Grassquit
Black-faced Grassquit
Orangequit
Greater Antillean Bullfinch
Jamaican Blackbird
Jamaican Oriole
Day 3
Up at 5:30 and on the road again. While packing the car I looked up as a Barn Owl flew overhead of the parking area. I ran in to get the others but it was out of sight by the time we came back out. It was threatening rain and was raining by the time we got back up Ecclesdown Rd. We had stopped at a few locations on the way and saw a good number of the endemics but nothing new. At one location we hear a very noisy Jamaican Crow, and spotted it on an open branch in the distance. Very lucky find as they live in the forest. Back up at our favorite spot the rain was coming down and we were birding by umbrella when Matthew noticed several Parrots directly above us. We finally got on them and there were 3-4 Black billed’s mixed in with about as many Yellow billed’s. As we had most of the endemics that could be found in the area we decided to head to Hardwar Gap a little early. As we slowly drove our way North on Ecclesdown we again rounded a corner and there was a Crested Quail Dove in the middle of the road. This one stayed put and gave excellent views.
Back on the road we took the long way to Hardwar Gap (as described above) and didn’t get to the park until early evening. By this time we were all very tired, somewhat irritated after being in the car 7 hours, and the weather had deteriorated significantly. It was raining hard and a dense mist/fog had rolled in cutting visibility to about 50 feet. We had no sooner pulled into the park when we noticed a bird materialize in the road, Rufous throated Solitaire. The only one we would see on the trip. We heard several others but this was the only one we saw.
I have to mention the trip up the mountain again. Once we took our detour and got back on the B1 in Kingston (the GPS routed us across Kingston on some roads that probably won’t make it to Frommer’s must visit locations) we headed up the mountain. We passed several small but fresh slides and saw a few basketball sized rocks on the road – it had been raining most of the day. We came to a sharp curve in the road and there was about 20 feet where the road was covered in about 6 inches of rock and soil with quite a bit of water flowing on the road as well. We were able to traverse the obstacle with little fanfare and came around the next corner where there was a Honda Civic sitting askew in the road with a giant boulder sitting in the road. We got out and took some pictures when the driver of the car returned and said it had happened about 30 minutes prior when the boulder fell down the mountain and smashed into his car when he was driving. Luckily no one was hurt and conveniently there was enough room to get by the boulder so we could continue on our way.
That night we reached the Starlight Chalet and were glad to have a bed and hot water for a shower. The hotel was adequate but nothing spectacular. The staff was very friendly and the hot water shower was very welcome. The rain and the altitude probably had the temperature somewhere in the low 60s and after the heat of the coast it felt a little cool.
Species Seen
Essentially the same as Day 2 with the addition of Barn Owl, Black-billed Parrot, and Rufous-throated Solitaire and subtracting Jamaican Blackbird
Day 4
We started the day at about 5:30 with a quick check of the hotel grounds taking in the spectacular views of the Blue Mountains and the coffee tracts on the surrounding hills. There were Red-billed Streamertails at the garden feeders. Today was the day we needed to get both Eleanias or they were going to be a miss. We were also starting to get a little worried about the Yellow shouldered Grassquit. The guide books list many habitat possibilities but we didn’t have any specific locations and this was causing some distress. By 6 we were back on the road to head back to Hardwar Gap Park and had not made it back to the main road when we came around the corner and there was a Crested Quail Dove in the road. This bird seems to turn up when you are least expecting it (photographers have your cameras on standby) and it is very skittish making for a difficult subject. A few hundred more yards and a few more curves and we came across a Caribbean Dove the only one of the trip. A few hundred more yards and we heard a buzzing call in a bamboo stand on a very steep cliff beside the road. We recognized the call right away and after a few minutes searching had 2 -3 Yellow Shouldered Grassquit. This was starting out to be a great day after the previous day’s tribulations.
We made it back to the paved road and headed to the park. We had one more target before we made it to the park – David still needed Jamaican Blackbird. We stopped at an area that had some older trees with lots of Bromelia in them. We spent an hour or so working up and down the road when I spotted a Jamaican Becard. I was getting David on the bird when I noticed a Jamaican Blackbird farther up in the same tree. This was starting to be an excellent day. After some picture taking, we made it to the park and started to work the parking area for the Eleania. David and I were working the entrance of the park when Matthew came over and said he thought he heard the Greater Antillean Eleania on the track road that leads downhill out of the parking area. About a hundred yards down the road, David spotted the bird about 2/3 the way up the hill in some type of conifer/juniper. We were now down to our last endemic (excepting the Owl which we were fairly certain we would get at Marshall’s Pen-Ann Sutton’s home). Not having a real good idea where to start looking we went over to the picnic area of the park (go straight on the entrance road) and started to look around. There was a fruiting tree and David and Matthew were getting some good photo ops on Jamaican Spindalis, Vireo, and Oriole when I heard what I thought was a Jamaican Eleania call. Some searching and I located the bird in a tall snag when it flew over to another type of conifer and started to feed. The bird seemed to be pretty loyal to that type tree as it worked along the ridge and eventually went downhill.
Having cleaned up all the endemics except Jamaican Owl, we had a few hours to fill so we headed down hill through Kingston and stopped at the ponds East of Kingston on the way to Portland Ridge. We added Caribbean Coot but not much else. We made it out to Portland ridge and stopped in town to ask the way to the lighthouse. As best we can tell you just take the main road straight through town until it turns into a dirt road. We never found the lighthouse but we did find our target, Bahama Mockingbird on a side track that dead ended at a house with a sign saying “welcome to Arizona”. It was pretty hot and the birds were getting scarce so we started to Mandeville to stay at Marshall’s Pen for the night.
We arrived at Marshall’s Pen about 5 and after talking to Ann and driving into town for some groceries, we met her under the big tree at dusk to look for Jamaican Owl. We heard it a few times but weren’t able to see it. We then walked down her lane and in front of the guest house had 2 Jamaican Owls that showed pretty well but a little briefly for photos. On the short walk back to the house Ann heard a distant Potoo and was able to call it in so we were all able to get good looks.
Species Seen (sorry the taxonomical order is jumbled due to the way I filtered in Excel)
Brown Pelican
Tricolored Heron
Little Blue Heron
Cattle Egret
Green Heron
Glossy Ibis
Clapper Rail
Caribbean Coot
Northern Jacana
Black-necked Stilt
Wilson's Plover
Killdeer
Lesser Yellowlegs
Greater Yellowlegs
Solitary Sandpiper
Spotted Sandpiper
Rock Pigeon
Zenaida Dove
White-winged Dove
Mangrove Cuckoo
Jamaican Lizard-Cuckoo
Smooth-billed Ani
Stolid Flycatcher
Bahama Mockingbird
Northern Mockingbird
Yellow Warbler
Common Ground-Dove
Caribbean Dove
Crested Quail-Dove
Green-rumped Parrotlet
Jamaican Mango
Black-billed Streamertail
Jamaican Tody
Jamaican Woodpecker
Jamaican Elaenia
Greater Antillean Elaenia
Sad Flycatcher
Rufous-tailed Flycatcher
Gray Kingbird
Loggerhead Kingbird
Jamaican Becard
Rufous-throated Solitaire
White-chinned Thrush
Black-whiskered Vireo
Bananaquit
Jamaican Spindalis
Yellow-faced Grassquit
Black-faced Grassquit
Yellow-shouldered Grassquit
Orangequit
Greater Antillean Grackle
Jamaican Oriole
Least Grebe
Olive-throated Parakeet
Jamaican Owl
Northern Potoo
Red-billed Streamertail
Vervain Hummingbird
Cave Swallow
Barn Swallow
Veery
White-eyed Thrush
European Starling
Jamaican Euphonia
Day 5
Having seen all the endemics, we had the day open and didn’t need to be in Montego Bay until the next day at noon. We got a late start, 6ish, and walked the grounds looking for a Ruddy Quail Dove for David and a few other birds the guys wanted to get better photos of. It was surprisingly slow so we decided (at my continual prodding) to move on. I really wanted to get West Indian Whistling Duck since I had heard it could be very difficult on some of the other Caribbean Islands and was virtually guaranteed at Royal Palm Reserve by Negril.
On our way to Negril, we swung by Elim Pools to look for Crake and possibly the Ducks as well. The water was very high and the best bird we saw there was Least Bittern. Back on the road, we made it to the Reserve in late afternoon and were greeted by a guard. Technically the reserve is closed but for 10USD a person he will let you walk around. True to what we had heard, when we walked around the main building we were practically mobbed by West Indian Whistling Ducks looking for hand outs. I always find it a little off putting when a lifer runs toward you but the ducks are really sharp looking and I like their call so it more than made up for their domestic habits. We spent another hour looking around the reserve for Crake but it seemed very dry and there was some sort of vine that had taken over the entire park. We didn’t add much else to the trip list – American Coot was all.
We were now faced with the long drive to Montego Bay and no hotel reservation awaiting. This is the first time I really missed my smartphone. We decided as a fitting end to a trip to Jamaica we should stay at one of the resorts on the beach like normal people do when they go to Jamaica. We found one listed in the GPS and headed there. They said they had one room left and one person would be on a roll away. At $300USD we decided to look around a bit. Our next choice was a place that we were all skeptical about. Matthew had been driving all day and was getting tired of our/my antics, so we decided to go with the known. Holiday Inn here we come. We checked in and went down to the buffet and gorged on all you can eat and Diet Coke, which is surprisingly difficult to find outside the major cities. After dinner and the somewhat ridiculous “native” dance show, I was looking forward to a hot shower and air conditioning.
Species Seen (sorry the taxonomical order is jumbled due to the way I filtered in Excel)
Pied-billed Grebe
West Indian Whistling-Duck
Blue-winged Teal
American Coot
White-crowned Pigeon
Least Bittern
Ruddy Duck
Limpkin
Purple Gallinule
Northern Rough-winged Swallow
Osprey
Day 6
Up at 6, David and Matthew decided to go for the full resort effect and went to the beach. I slept in. After a buffet breakfast we went over to the sewage ponds to see if we could round up a Masked Duck before we went to the airport. There were some ducks but no masked. The only new birds we added were Laughing Gull, Ruddy Turnstone (scrounging leftovers at the buffet), and House Sparrow.
We ended up with 113 species, all of the endemics, and good number of the near endemics. Our only misses on the trip were the Crakes, Plain Pigeon (Ann said they were very hard to find), Caribbean Martin (none had been report for the year when we were there), and few of the introduced species which we didn’t look for.
Least Grebe
Pied-billed Grebe
Brown Pelican
Magnificent Frigatebird
Great Blue Heron
Great Egret
Tricolored Heron
Little Blue Heron
Snowy Egret
Cattle Egret
Green Heron
Yellow-crowned Night-Heron
Least Bittern
White Ibis
Glossy Ibis
West Indian Whistling-Duck
Blue-winged Teal
Ruddy Duck
Turkey Vulture
Osprey
Red-tailed Hawk
American Kestrel
Limpkin
Clapper Rail
Purple Gallinule
Common Moorhen
American Coot
Caribbean Coot
Northern Jacana
Black-necked Stilt
Wilson's Plover
Killdeer
Greater Yellowlegs
Lesser Yellowlegs
Solitary Sandpiper
Spotted Sandpiper
Ruddy Turnstone
Laughing Gull
Royal Tern
Rock Pigeon
White-crowned Pigeon
Ring-tailed Pigeon
Zenaida Dove
White-winged Dove
Common Ground-Dove
Caribbean Dove
Crested Quail-Dove
Olive-throated Parakeet
Green-rumped Parrotlet
Yellow-billed Parrot
Black-billed Parrot
Mangrove Cuckoo
Jamaican Lizard-Cuckoo
Chestnut-bellied Cuckoo
Smooth-billed Ani
Barn Owl
Jamaican Owl
Northern Potoo
Antillean Nighthawk
Black Swift
White-collared Swift
Antillean Palm-Swift
Jamaican Mango
Red-billed Streamertail
Black-billed Streamertail
Vervain Hummingbird
Jamaican Tody
Jamaican Woodpecker
Jamaican Elaenia
Greater Antillean Elaenia
Jamaican Pewee
Sad Flycatcher
Rufous-tailed Flycatcher
Stolid Flycatcher
Gray Kingbird
Loggerhead Kingbird
Jamaican Becard
Tree Swallow
Northern Rough-winged Swallow
Cave Swallow
Barn Swallow
Bahama Mockingbird
Northern Mockingbird
Rufous-throated Solitaire
Veery
White-eyed Thrush
White-chinned Thrush
Jamaican Crow
European Starling
House Sparrow
Jamaican Vireo
Blue Mountain Vireo
Black-whiskered Vireo
Northern Parula
Yellow Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Palm Warbler
Arrow-headed Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Ovenbird
Common Yellowthroat
Bananaquit
Jamaican Spindalis
Jamaican Euphonia
Yellow-faced Grassquit
Black-faced Grassquit
Yellow-shouldered Grassquit
Orangequit
Greater Antillean Bullfinch
Jamaican Blackbird
Greater Antillean Grackle
Jamaican Oriole