I am visiting tobago August fior two weeks beginning of month. Anybody else been at that time ? Any advice would be welcome. I am staying at Arnos Vale and Blue Waters a week each. Have contacted Newton George and should go out with him for at least a day. Is a visit to Little Tobago any good at this time of the year?
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Birding in Tobago August (2 Viewers)
- Thread starter wheatear
- Start date
Steve G
RAINBIRDER
Missed the fact that this is your first post-welcome to Birdforum.
Try sending a PM to Bill Murphy -user: murph3000 -I think his email is displayed in his personal profile (He wrote the book on birding in T&T). It is also worth doing a search: click on search forums tab at top left of this thread & type in Tobago.
Try sending a PM to Bill Murphy -user: murph3000 -I think his email is displayed in his personal profile (He wrote the book on birding in T&T). It is also worth doing a search: click on search forums tab at top left of this thread & type in Tobago.
Birding Tobago August
Sure I will post you a trip report when I return. Hopefully having seen most of the Tobago specialities.
Cheers
Wheatear
Steve G said:Sorry I can't give you any advice on this but I would be very interested to hear how you get on. Any chance of a brief report when you return?
Cheers B
Sure I will post you a trip report when I return. Hopefully having seen most of the Tobago specialities.
Cheers
Wheatear
wheatear said:
I've been to T&T in August and the birding was both good and enjoyable, but be prepared for some rain. Some of the "wetlands" were quite dry but this will depend upon what weather codnitions they have experienced in the preceding months.
Little Tobago is worth the visit - you should get good sightings of boobies and tropicbirds as well as numerous passerines on the walk through the island. A scope is helpful but extremely difficult to use from the main watchpoint.
Thanks Alf
I am sure it will be agood trip and very fruitful. How many species did you see in August? Do you have trip list at all? I have just recieved Birds Of Venuzueala By Hilty etal. Not sure if all the Tobago birds are in it but will have to see. The Ffrench book looks very poor from an illustration point of view. I would like to hear of your experiences with these if you used them. And any guides you used.
Many thanks
wheatear
I am sure it will be agood trip and very fruitful. How many species did you see in August? Do you have trip list at all? I have just recieved Birds Of Venuzueala By Hilty etal. Not sure if all the Tobago birds are in it but will have to see. The Ffrench book looks very poor from an illustration point of view. I would like to hear of your experiences with these if you used them. And any guides you used.
Many thanks
wheatear
I visited Trinidad and Tobago 9 days in April/May last year, so no specific info on August. The Murphy book is definitely worth the effort as that has bar graphs with variation of bird availability throughout the year and directions to a lot of locations; look at http://www.birderbill.us/. Reports are available at http://maybank.tripod.com/SouthAmerica/TT-Index.htm. I used a combination of the ffrench book and DeShauensee (spelling?) for Venezuela, and having both was better than having only one. I don't think that every Caribbean specialty is covered by any Venezuela guide, but I might be wrong.
With two weeks, I would use time on both Islands; there are a limited number of birds on Tobago but many more on Trinidad. I had one day with Newton George, and that basically cleaned up the Tobago specialties. Another half day (at least) should be used at the wet areas near the Tobago airport for things like white-cheeked pintail etc.
HTH
Niels
With two weeks, I would use time on both Islands; there are a limited number of birds on Tobago but many more on Trinidad. I had one day with Newton George, and that basically cleaned up the Tobago specialties. Another half day (at least) should be used at the wet areas near the Tobago airport for things like white-cheeked pintail etc.
HTH
Niels
A link to a report in Audubon magazine on Trinidad http://magazine.audubon.org/features0507/trinidad.html
Niels
Niels
wheatear said:
Hi Wheatear
I arranged my trip through Nigel Moorhouse at Sarus Bird Tours, who I can thoroughly recommend. The trip provided ca. 185 sightings which was regarded as a little low compared with other trips. Conditions at such as Caroni (sp?) and the airfield were not good due to a lack of rain and influenced the number of species found. Just limiting your visit to Tobago will reduce the number of species that you see quite considerably, but you should connect with a number of speciality birds.
The illustrations in Ffrench are disappointing but the descriptive elements are really very good. The Venezuala book is excellent, for Venezuala, but quite over the top for the birds that you will encounter in Tobago.
We had a most interesting guide by the name of Roger Neckles, who is a well known (in the US) wildlife photographer and also something of a character. I don't know if he still does guiding.
In Tobago we stayed at Cuffie River which is much less used by birders but highly recommended as a place and for birding in general.
Thanks for the info Niels,
Most of the Tobago birds are in Hilty's book. I like to soak-up birds in locations like Tobago so will probably not get to Trinidad, but will almost certainly be there at some point in the near future. How wet is it at that time of year? Do you need wellies on the Main Ridge?
Phil Whittaker
Most of the Tobago birds are in Hilty's book. I like to soak-up birds in locations like Tobago so will probably not get to Trinidad, but will almost certainly be there at some point in the near future. How wet is it at that time of year? Do you need wellies on the Main Ridge?
Phil Whittaker
There are no chiggers in Tobago or so I am told. I got a good fungal disease in Gambia on my toes no shoe/sandal birding. I also got some amazing species at the same time in great surroundings with great guides. So it was well worth it. I will use my usual footwear in Tobago and forget anbout the potential problems from leeches. They are supposed to be good for lowering your blood pressure and mine will probably be high if I miss any of the speciality birds.
Wheatear
Wheatear
My previous post was written without access to my books. I have now looked in Bill Murphy's book, and chiggers are mentioned for Trinidad, with nothing for Tobago, so you are probably right on that. Leeches are not mentioned at all. I had the impression that leeches was a problem in Africa and Asia, not in the Americas, am I wrong on that?
If anyone think that my previous post was a little over the top, then have my apologies.
Niels
If anyone think that my previous post was a little over the top, then have my apologies.
Niels
njlarsen said:
No problems. I was obviously wrong about leeches in the Carribean. One of the sites in Tobago has a guy standing outside renting out wellingtons which I was told were highly recommended due to the presence of a number of "lethal" beasties.
I guess that you wouldn't be in too much trouble to refuse these but do remember the local micro-economy.
wheatear said:
Hi Phil
As you will have learnt from the trip reports Tobago is not very big and I think that all of the best sites are covered in these reports. A short one by Ernest Garcia on Birdtours from Nov 2003 is quite informative.
We were guided throughout so also went to the best known sites - I think it was Gilpin Trace where we used the wellies.
The contrast with Trinidad was marked. Whilst there were fewer species to go for there was also a lack of the underlying security threat that was evident in some parts of Trinidad. Tobago seemed to be universally laid back and friendly in comparison.
Enjoy,
Alf
murph3000
Member
Steve G said:
You can view a list of species we saw in August 1992 at http://www.birderbill.us/tt_8_92.htm Unfortunately I didn't note in the list which species were seen on which island (only just learning HTML back then), but we usually see about 70 spp. on Tobago and about 175 on Trinidad, with a total of 225-235 these days.
Chiggers are unknown from Tobago. I think it might be a result of their inability to withstand dessication and the narrowness of Tobago. The greatest distance a chigger could get from the sea is 3.5 miles, and salt spray moves farther inland than that during high winds. Thus I believe the environment is not conducive to chigger happiness.
Newton George is the man to see on Tobago these days, with Adolphus James and his son Gladwyn right up there, too. I'm glad others have found these gentlemen to be as delightful as I've found them. Gladwyn was in a very serious motor vehicle accident in January and was flown to Trinidad for medical treatment of his legs. I wonder if anyone has heard of his condition since then. I would be very interested in knowing how he is.
--Bill Murphy, Indianapolis, Indiana
Where chiggers are all too often present
