Big Year Birding in Hawaii - Part 3

On Monday, October 16, 2023, Bill Kaempfer, John Vanderpoel and I got an early start, driving for an hour to our meeting spot with Jack Jeffrey, a retired USFWS biologist who worked on conservation of Hawaii’s endemic honeycreepers. In retirement, he has a reputation as the premier photographer of Hawaii’s endemic birds. His photographs have appeared in many high quality publications including several of his own books on Hawaiian birds. He also is one of a small handful of guides who are licensed to take clients into the restricted Hakalau Forest National Wildlife Refuge. We hired him to show us the full suite of endemics that the forest had to offer. Jack’s unique experience working on the forest conservation project for decades makes him much more than a birding guide. He is a veritable fountain of valuable information. He is also one of the wittiest people I have ever met. Expect almost every other sentence from him to contain a pun, witticism or joke. 

We met Jack at the rendezvous point at 6:30 AM. A Hawaiian Short-eared Owl was hunting nearby. We climbed into his high clearance SUV for the slow drive along a two-track towards the Hakalau Forest. As we neared the trailhead Jack spotted a drab green Hawaiian Creeper (798) which posed for photographs. At the trailhead about a dozen pairs of Hawaiian Goose (also known as Nene, 799) staked out their territories fearlessly in a grassy meadow as we parked nearby. 

On the hiking trail, we found Hawaiian Elepaio, Apapane, I’iwi, Oma’o, Hawaiian Creeper, Hawaiian Amikihi, Akepa (800) and Aki’apolau’u (801). I obtained quality photos and audio files for most of these species. These files will be available on the eBird checklist as well as my Hawaii Trip Report which can be viewed at

https://ebird.org/tripreport/163843. 

We also had a delightful encounter  with a curious Khalij Pheasant that decided to join us for our picnic lunch which Jack had graciously prepared for the group. 

On the trail we met another small  birding group being led by Lance Tanino, a well known Hawaiian birding guide. Lance had originally offered to guide me in Hawaii but his availability changed and he had to cancel. It was good to finally meet him face to face. He informed me that there was space on a pelagic boat trip he had organized from Kona the following Saturday October 21. I jumped at the opportunity. John Vanderpoel had encouraged me to take as many pelagic boat trips as possible. From reading his book entitled Full Chase Mode, I learned that one can never have too many pelagic opportunities during a Big Year. I was excited about my upcoming pelagic trips. Bill and John had wanted to do a pelagic from either Kona or later in their trip, from Kauai, but had not been able to find a reasonably priced charter for two or three people.  Instead they hired a young birding guide named Adrian Burke to lead a land-based sea watch in Kauai. Burke had been recommended by Linus Blomqvist, another Big Year birder who had recently visited Hawaii. 

The next day, we packed up our bags and cleaned up our house, which was on loan to us by Colorado birder Ellen Schwenne. (Thanks so much Ellen!!). We made some birding stops around Kona, adding Lavender Waxbill (802) to the trip list thanks to a tip from Jack Jeffrey. This tiny arboreal estrildid finch was one of my favorite birds of the trip. Some big misses from the island of Hawaii were Palila, an endemic finch, and Japanese Quail, an exotic species. Also two other exotic species which we would have better luck finding on Kauai: Chestnut Munia and Red Avadavat. I had reached the lofty milestone of 800 species in 2023. Bill was on the verge of reaching 700 species in the ABA Area. We toasted to our success on the Big Island. We had seen almost everything it had to offer us. We boarded the 7 PM flight from Kona to Lihue (Kauai) via Honolulu. 

More Hawaiian adventures and novel Big Year bird species awaited us in Kauai.