Brown Noddy

While we were taking a boat trip around the beautiful NaPali Coast of the island of Kauai, we passed some cliffs with a colony of Brown Noddies (Below). The Brown Noddy is a tropical seabird in the tern family which is mostly brown except for a white forehead blending into a gray nape, and small white half-eye ring. It has a wedge-shaped tail with a small notch at the tip. It has a long slender black bill and black legs and feet. .

A colony of Brown Noddies on a cliff edge; NaPali Coast, Kauai, Hawaii; 7/9/10.

The Brown Noddy is colonial, usually nesting on elevated situations on cliffs or in short trees or shrubs. It only occasionally nests on the ground. A single egg is laid by the female of a pair each breeding season. I feel fortunate to have spotted these because its only breeding colony in the contiguous United States is in Dry Tortugas at the tip of Florida, about 70 miles west of Key West.