So I went to Fiji

 

When I made plans to return to the Philippines from DC at the end of this year, my plan really wasn't to do any more travel. Perhaps some local trips, yes, but mostly I was going to be teleworking, joining some meetings in Manila, and spending time with family. Well, shortly after I bought tickets, in came the call from the office: as long as you're in the region, do you have time for a quick trip to Fiji? Fiji you say? Well, I guess if you twist my arm... 

Up til now my work has been restricted to Southeast Asia proper- the Philippines, Indonesia, and Cambodia for the most part. My region is technically called "East Asia and the Pacific" though, so it was only a matter of time before a project in the Pacific Islands came along. This one happened to fall into our laps unexpectedly, and the travel was all arranged rather last minute, but I wasn't going to be looking this particular gift horse in the mouth. Fiji has been on my radar for over a decade, ever since my uncles visited for a birding trip way back in 2011, and I've been ogling its surprisingly good collection of endemic birds ever since. Suddenly, I was about to spend a week there. My job has its perks.

From my experience when most people think of Fiji it conjures vague images of either overpriced bottled water or a tropical paradise somewhere in the Pacific, possibly adjacent to Hawaii and Tahiti. It's actually located far closer to Australia than it is to Hawaii, and is culturally quite distinct from the other two, being part of Melanesia rather than Polynesia. It's the southeasternmost of the major Melanesian islands, and the last of the big ones before the Pacific turns into an enormous expanse of nothingness broken up by tiny atolls and the occasional volcanic island. Its two main islands, Viti Levu and Vanua Levu, have been around for over 10 million years, which gives them a much more diverse selection of birds and reptiles than are found in most of the other Pacific islands. There were some extinctions with the arrival of humans (most tragically the spectacular Megavitiornis), but there are still over 150 species of birds found in the country, 33 of which are endemic including a truly spectacular suite of doves, parrots, flycatchers, and more. 

Of course, a work trip is a work trip, and most of my time would be spent either doing field visits far outside birding areas, or in office buildings in the capital city of Suva. Thankfully, I was able to finagle an early arrival, getting in on a Saturday night when work wouldn't start until Monday morning. That left me with all of Sunday for birding. One full day is enough to see most or (with a bit of luck) all of the Fijian endemic birds that can be found on Viti Levu, Fiji's largest island, though not the other dozen or so endemics that are only on the outlying islands. Some of those are quite challenging however, and require not only a great deal of luck but also some trekking into remote areas. With that in mind, I ended up hiring Vilikesa (Vili) Masibalavu, who had guided for my uncle many years ago and came highly recommended.

After a fun layover in Sydney, I boarded my flight to Fiji in the early afternoon of December 2. As soon as I touched down in the Nadi airport that evening, things started going wrong. Nadi (pronounced "nandi" for some reason) is the main international airport in Fiji, but it's located on the opposite side of Viti Levu from Suva, the capital and largest city of Fiji and also most of the birding spots. There are frequent cheap flights going from Nadi to Suva, but that meant I had a relatively tight layover once I arrived. That was fine, except I found myself waiting forlornly at the baggage claim realizing with ever-growing dread that my checked bag, with all my clothing inside it, was not coming. I hurriedly filled out a missed baggage form and then sprinted to the opposite end of the airport to check in for my flight to Suva, resigning myself to that fact that I was going to be doing a day of intense tropical forest birding in jeans. 

Gee, I wonder where this flight is going

I arrived at the domestic terminal sweaty and out of breath, only to find out that they're pretty chill about check-in times in Fiji; as long as you get to the terminal 15 minutes before the flight you're good. In fact, they won't even allow passengers into the departure area until 10 minutes before the flight leaves, which will invariably be an hour after the scheduled time. It was a quick 30-minute flight to Suva, then another half hour by taxi til I got to my hotel, the Rainforest Eco Lodge in the Colo-i-Suva area in the hills above Suva proper. The night's fun wasn't over, of course, as I got to the hotel only to find that they'd already given my room to someone else. The security guard clearly had no idea what he was supposed to do about that, and eventually I agreed to pay for a whole new room in hopes they would resolve it in the morning. It was all eventually worked out, but it was just another episode in the comedy of errors that had been my day's travel. 

Vili picked me up at the hotel early in the morning the next day. He was recommended to me by several people, and is renowned as probably Fiji's best birding guide. I can certainly confirm that, as he did a great job of guiding that day, and was in general great conversation and a really nice guy. Aside from being a guide, he also works for BirdLife International Fiji doing bird surveys and conservation throughout the Pacific, and has the distinction of having rediscovered the mysterious Long-legged Thicketbird in 2003, after it had been missing and feared extinct for decades. He's clearly someone who was in this for a genuine love of birds and birding, which isn't something I can say for every guide I've met. 

From my hotel it was another 45-minute drive into the hills of Viti Levu north of Suva, where Vili had recently discovered new sites for some tough endemics. While most of Fiji's endemic birds are fairly easy within any forest areas, some of them are absolute bastards. As I would have the rest of the week to look for the easy birds, I figured I would concentrate on the hardest ones this morning, namely Long-legged Thicketbird, Black-throated Shrikebill, and Pink-billed Parrotfinch. I was also hoping to try for Tongan Ground Dove, a non-endemic bird that's hard to see throughout its range. 

We made our way through the Fijian countryside in Vili's beat up old van, and I was treated to a gorgeous misty sunrise in the process. I managed to get some of my first endemics on the drive: Fiji Woodswallows perching on phone wires, Fiji Parrotfinches flushing from the roadside, and flyovers from Masked Shining Parrots and Collared Lories. At a bridge near our final destination I saw a Pacific Black Duck and a Pacific Reef Heron, nice additions to my Fiji list.

Scenes from along the road

Vili parked along the road in an unassuming bit of countryside that looked more or less like everywhere else we'd been driving to, but where he said he had recently seen Pink-billed Parrotfinch. Unlike Fiji Parrotfinch, which is incredibly common and conspicuous, Pink-billed Parrotfinch is almost never seen, as it's a tiny, uncommon bird that sticks to the treetops and is incredibly mobile, with no established territories or reliable spots. The only way to find it is to listen for its incredibly high-pitched chip calls and hope you get lucky. Getting lucky and hearing high-pitched calls are possibly the two areas of birding that I'm worst at, so unsurprisingly I completely dipped on the parrotfinch, making it the only real miss of my Fiji trip. There were a few other birds around, including lots of Barking Imperial Pigeons and a heard-only Golden Dove, but nothing that really allowed for good photo opportunities.

Barking Imperial Pigeon, a surprisingly common Fiji endemic

Our roadside birding spot

It was an inauspicious start to the morning, but I had other targets to look for so we pressed onward. Down the road was a little patch of hill forest that Vili has been working on turning into a forest reserve along with the local community. It's not much now, just some rough trails through the woods, but it's host to some of Fiji's rarest endemic birds. Vili took me to one of the territories of Long-legged Thicketbird, possibly my biggest target for the day. We sat for a while and listened but there was no sign of the thicketbirds, only the much-more-common Fiji Bush Warblers and a couple of noisy Kikau, an endemic honeyeater. Masked Shining Parrots, Collared Lories, and an unidentified bat flew over, but mostly didn't want to be photographed.

Kikau, also known by the much worse name of Western Wattled Honeyeater

Probably a Samoan Flying Fox, although bat people are famously unhelpful when it comes to ID

There was no thicketbird at the first spot, but Vili knew of several other territories in this bit of forest, so we continued onward. At the next spot there was still no thicketbird, but instead we heard the song of a Black-throated Shrikebill. I played the song for a bit, and soon a gorgeous male flew in and perched right in front of us! This is another of Fiji's rarest endemics, being very low density and confined to good forest, so we were both thrilled. This individual proved to be unusually tame and inquisitive, and I ended up getting some of the best (and only) pictures of the species ever taken. It was certainly a highlight of my birding year! Vili thought he might have heard a Pink-billed Parrotfinch as well, but it only called once and I certainly didn't hear it, so it will remain a dip for me.

Black-throated Shrikebill!

With the shrikebill to lift our spirits, we continued on through the forest. There were many other good birds around–Fiji Bush Warbler, Fiji Whistler, Fiji Shrikebill, Slaty Monarch, and Fiji Streaked Fantail to name a few–but the canopy was dense and photography was nearly impossible. Finally, we heard the burbling call of a Long-legged Thicketbird from a ravine nearby us. We scrambled down into the ravine to try and see it, and Vili had me go ahead to try and find a viewpoint. It involved quite a bit of picking my way over slippery rocks and muddy riverbanks (in jeans!), but eventually I found an okay place to sit. Soon, the thicketbird was singing from just a few meters away, but buried deep within the thick undergrowth. Part of why it took so long to rediscover the species is that it's restricted to extremely thick undergrowth in steep ravines and gullies in hill forest. Once you know the territory they're relatively easy to hear, but nearly impossible to see well, let alone photograph- similar to Bagobo Babbler in the Philippines. 

Finally, I got decent views of a thicketbird as it flew from one side of the ravine to the other, but no picture. I wasn't really expecting one as essentially no-one ever photographs it. Still, I figured it would be nice to try. We continued on to another area, hoping for another thicketbird or at least the call of a Tongan Ground Dove. There were no doves to be found, but we did hear another calling Long-legged Thicketbird. After a burst of playback it strolled right past us singing, but we never even caught a glimpse. Now that I had a better idea of how to see them, I half-climbed, half-slid down the muddy embankment of this ravine until I found a spot I could sit with a decent view of the other side of the river. Surprisingly enough, it worked- after half an hour or so of patient waiting, I spotted it walking silently along the forest floor across the ravine, and even managed to get a couple of pictures! Mind you the pictures are just about as bad as it's possible to get while still being diagnostic, but given that the number of people who have taken pictures of Long-legged Thicketbird in the wild can be counted on hand it was still amazing. 

Long-legged Thicketbird!

Flush with success, we headed out of the forest and drove down the road a bit to Vili's ancestral village to have tea and snacks with his brother and his family. While Vili mostly grew up in Suva, keeping tracking of one's ancestral village and land is extremely important in Fijian culture, and he and his siblings regularly return there to tend to their family homes and farms. After refreshments we returned to the forest once more to do another loop of looking for ground doves or parrotfinches. It was nearing 90 degrees Fahrenheit by then and my two-day-old clothes were completely caked in mud and sweat, but I figured as long as I was there I might as well give it a try. As expected we came up short on our remaining targets, but I did get some good looks at a Fiji Streaked Fantail, another rarely-photographed endemic. 

The interior of Viti Levu

Vili's ancestral village

Fiji Streaked Fantail

August Dart (Oriens augustula)

Asian Magpie Moth (Nyctemera baulus)

Melanesobasis mcleani, an endemic damselfly

It had been a successful morning but we were still missing some primary targets, most especially Golden Dove, possibly the bird I most wanted to see in all of Fiji. We grabbed lunch in the outskirts of Suva, then headed back to the Colo-i-Suva area to the Pipeline Road, another well-known birding spot. The Colo-i-Suva area has most of the Viti Levu endemics except for the thicketbird and Pink-billed Parrotfinch, which are restricted to higher altitudes. This area meanwhile is lower down and has quite a bit of good-quality primary forest, which makes it better for some other endemics. 

The Pipeline Road was as quiet as you might expect for early afternoon in the tropical lowlands, and there wasn't much at first except for a flyover from a flock of noisy Masked Shining Parrots. As we walked back, however, we heard the strange, barking call of a Golden Dove. After a bit of searching, one finally flew out of a thick tree and perched in the open! It was tinier than I expected (barely bigger than an avocado), but still just as spectacular as I hoped- a brilliant lemon yellow, with hairlike feathers that made it look like it had been sculpted out of clay. They really don't make doves much better than this one. A couple of noisy Giant Honeyeaters also made an appearance, though they were surprisingly difficult to photograph.

Golden Dove!

Giant Honeyeater

Euploea lewinii

Leucauge hebridesiana

Bamboo Orchid (Arundina graminifolia)

Ground Orchid (Spathoglottis pacifica)

Alpinia boia, endemic to Fiji and possibly the largest species of ginger in the world

Scenery on the pipeline road

The Golden Dove successfully seen, we headed to the Rainforest Lodge so that I could get my refund, and so we could look for some other birds. There were many Collared Lories zipping around over our heads, and I found some of them foraging in a flowering palm tree just above eye level, allowing me to get some great pictures, despite the terrible lighting. There was also a confiding Barking Imperial Pigeon and a few Vanikoro Flycatchers around in the trees just over the hotel rooms. One thing I was quickly coming to appreciate about Fiji was that the density of birds is just incredibly high- they're everywhere you look, and generally fairly easy to see and photograph. After spending so long in the Philippines and Indonesia, where so many birds are being hunted or trapped out of existence, it's a surreal experience to have fat pigeons and technicolored parrots hanging out so casually around humans. Kudos to Fijians I suppose for not persecuting their wildlife.

Collared Lory

Barking Imperial Pigeon

Vanikoro Flycatcher

Asarkina oceanica

Common Fijian Ringlet (Ypthima sesara)

Some very sweet hotel dogs (and my extremely dirty jeans)

That was all the birding we had time for, as I had to fly back to Nadi that evening. Vili took me through Suva proper so that I could buy some clothes at a mall, since it wasn't clear whether or not I would have my luggage by the time I started work the next day. We also stopped by some open fields near the airport so that we could look for Fiji Goshawk, the only accipiter on the island. I soon spotted a Fiji Goshawk swooping into a tree, but by the time I got out of the car I couldn't relocate it for a picture. 

Back in Nadi, it was a major relief to find that my baggage had, in fact, made it onto the next flight out of Sydney and was waiting for me at the airport. I got my bag, signed the mountain of forms I needed to sign, and took a taxi to my hotel near the airport where I pretty much collapsed as soon as I had arrived and taken a much, much needed shower. 

I was working for the rest of the time I was in Fiji, but thankfully a variety of birding opportunities presented themselves. The first two days I spent doing field visits in rural Viti Levu, mostly in the north part of the islands. Prevailing winds in the South Pacific blow from the southeast, which means that Viti Levu is split almost evenly between a lush, rainy southeast and a hot, dry northwest. The difference was shocking, as instead of the rainforest and fruit trees I had been seeing near Suva, I was instead surrounded by dusty sugarcane plantations and deforested, grassy hillsides. The northwest is where Fiji's sugarcane industry is based, and where thousands of Indians were brought in by the British to act as indentured laborers on the plantations. To this day Indo-Fijians make up a significant proportion of Fiji's population, especially on Viti Levu. The heavy industry, deforestation, and dry climate also make the northwest more susceptible to landslides and catastrophic flooding- one of the things my work project hoped to address. 

A village in northwestern Viti Levu

After a day of field visits in the countryside, I returned to my hotel in Nadi and had a quick walk around before sunset. Bird density in Fiji is high everywhere, but outside of forest areas most of that density is introduced birds- mainly Common Mynas, Jungle Mynas, and Red-vented Bulbuls. In an open field by my hotel there was also a big flock of Red Avadavats- also introduced, but gorgeous enough I didn't quite mind. There were a few native birds as well- some singing Vanikoro Flycatchers, fledgling Polynesian Trillers begging to be fed, a couple of noisy Kikau, and a distant Fiji Woodswallow. The highlight, though, was a little group of brilliantly colored Fiji Parrotfinches foraging in the hotel lawn. Parrotfinches in most of the world are like Pink-billed Parrotfinch- incredibly shy and nomadic, and generally extremely difficult to track down or see. Apparently Fiji Parrotfinch missed that memo though, as they're incredibly numerous and conspicuous, and are perfectly happy in urban environments like this as long as there's grass to feed on. Not that I'm complaining.

Jungle Myna

Red Avadavat

Female Polynesian Triller

Begging baby Polynesian Triller

Fiji Woodswallow- probably the most common Fiji endemic that I completely missed getting a good picture of

Kikau

Fiji Parrotfinch

Well this is something I was much less excited to see- a Small Indian Mongoose, introduced in the colonial era and responsible for the decline or extinction of endemic birds and reptiles throughout the Pacific Islands, including Fiji

My second day of field visits included a coastal village that was doing a coral planting project. Interestingly it had nothing to do with tourism or even really environmentalism per se, but rather it started because the youth in the village realized that their local waters were practically fishless after they lost their coral. They've been rehabilitating the reef for about 5 years now, and the results are incredible- all it takes is a small amount of healthy coral for a stupendous diversity of reef fish to show up. The fish are happy and the villagers have fishing grounds, so it works out well all around.

Coastal Fiji

Of course, it behooved me as an employee to invest this project further, so I got out my underwater camera and strapped on my goggles to take a closer look. I don't go snorkeling nearly as often as I should, and every time I do I'm reminded of why I should do it more. Coral reef fish are ridiculously diverse, colorful, and unafraid of people, and as someone who deeply enjoys his listing that's a very good combo. I'm also always reminded that underwater photography is, in fact, very difficult and that I'm very bad at it. I suppose I always will be, at least until I invest in a proper camera setup rather than my little point and shoot.

Corals on an A-frame planter, with lots of Humbug and Blue-green Chromis

Sixbar Wrasse

Blue Linckia

Longnose Filefish

The regenerated reef

Dusky Gregory

Vagabond Butterflyfish

Fluted Giant Clam

Spotfin Squirrelfish

Honeycomb Grouper

The rest of my time in Fiji was spent in or around Suva, and mostly inside office buildings. That said, it's hard not to be motivated to do more birding when Fiji birding is as good as it is, so I was able to squeeze in quite a bit more. I was kind of hoping to squeeze the whole week into a single blog post, but in order to avoid this becoming a computer-crashing monstrosity, I'll have to split it in two. Many, many more Fiji endemics are yet to come!