Heading South

In just a few hours I am hopping on a plane to take me from Columbus to Marsh Harbour, on Abaco Island in the Bahamas.  This marks the beginning of a pretty wild ride for me, beginning with three months as a research tech on Abaco.  I will be assisting a Florida State University biologist who is studying the endemic and endangered Bahama Parrot.  Our summer will include everything from banding to behavioral observations, so I plan on becoming quite familiar with these interesting parrots (pictures when I see them!).  However, these parrots are not the only birds to see on this island.  I picked up Herb Raffaele's 'Birds of the West Indies' to guide me through the avifauna on Abaco.  This, along with the somewhat crazy tale of birding the entire Caribbean by Craig Faanes called 'Somewhere South of Miami', has really got me pumped up for the summer.

As good as Raffaele's field guide is, it is not specific to Abaco, or even the Bahamas.  The guide covers the entire West Indies, and I will unfortunately not have time to see all of these sweet islands.  Therefore, I took some time to go through the book and pick out the birds that would definitely be on Abaco while I am there, as well as possible flybys or stopover migrants.  Here is the first part of what I have (roughly) come up with:

I have the entire checklist, and I'll try to post updates as I can.

So my hopes are high to not only experience the awesome well-known wildlife of Abaco, but also maybe some unusual flying visitors as well.  Check back often for photo-dumps of what I am seeing!