Kauai Wildlife

One of my favorite things about traveling is discovering new kinds of plants and animals.  Or just seeing some wildlife I don't see in my normal day to day life.  It never ceases to amaze me all of the beautiful and wonderful creatures God has made.

The following are some wildlife pictures from my recent visit to the island Kauai in Hawaii.  I'm not going to mention the fish or sea turtles, because I wrote all about that in my post about snorkeling so check that out if you're interested in sea life. 

Farm Animals

The most common animals I tend to see are farm animals.  Kauai was no except and had, cow, pigs, goats, sheep, horses, and chickens. 

One of the cool things about the horses was that often times they were tied up to the outside of the fence along the road.  I guess that way they could eat all the tall grass along the road. 

Chickens and roosters were not only kept in pens by the locals, but also roamed the entire island free.  They liked to congregate at the tourist attractions looking for handouts no doubt, but they could even be heard or spotted when back in remote forest trails.  

One thing I learned about roosters is that they crow all throughout the day not just in the morning.

Parking Lot Chickens

Jungle Rooster

Reptiles & Amphibians

The most common reptile I saw in Kauai were lizards.  There were several different varieties.  Some were green and some were brown.

Some did a cool neck thing where their neck expanded which had red on it.

In addition to lizards there were geckos.  I didn't see them as much as the lizards though.  

Lastly in the amphibian department I saw one lovely forest toad.  There we some other toads, but sadly they were smashed on the road.  

Mammals

The most common mammal as far as I could tell was the elusive... feral cat! LOL

But the island also had deer, wild pigs, and wild goats.  I saw three wild pigs, two brown ones and one gray one.  However, I didn't get a picture of them cause they were too fast!  My sister got one though!

Taken by my sister not me.

I also got to see one of the highly endangered Hawaii Monk Seals! 

According to a sign posted they estimate there are only about 1,500 left in the wild. Because of that, its a crime to harm them and they post these warning signs around them when ever one shows up on the beach.

Birds

Apart from the chickens which were by far the most common bird on the island, there were many different kinds of beautiful little song birds.

There were also the Hawaii State bird the Hawaiian Goose or Nene.

The interesting thing about Nene is that they build their nests in holes in the ground under bushes and they guard the entrances.  They sounded like angry cats growling when you got near them!  At first we thought they were just more feral cats, but then realized it was the geese! 

One of the most beautiful birds on the island were these white birds with long tails called koa'e kea.  I didn't get any good pictures of them but here is a mountain side covered with them.

All the the little white specks on the mountain are these birds! They looked very Jurassic to me with their long tails.  They also just seemed to love to fly in very picturesque areas such as a water fall we visited which made them appear even more beautiful!  

One of the funniest bird to watch was this Sandpiper type bird.

This little fella was doing an excellent job of snatching small crabs from the rocks for dinner, but having a hard time keeping out of the waves!  Twice he almost few right at me trying to avoid the waves.  It's kind of hard to see but I caught him in action here.

Insects

So one of the most common insects on the island was the mosquito unfortunately!  At least I assume so because of the bug bites! LOL! However, there were some other cool sighting as well.  Including this interesting looking spider!  We found this guy hanging out in our back yard!

There were also bees.  Regular honey bees and some big black carpenter bees.

I saw this random weird little bug on this lovely flower.  I don't know what it is though.

Lastly my favorite insect were these gigantic snails!  I thought we had big snails in California, but these ones were much larger! 

Top view to show off the whole twisty shell

Snails close up

Crustacean

Lastly I just want to point out that there were some really cool crabs that I really enjoyed watching too.  There were big black ones and tiny sand colored ones.  They were all enjoyable to watch as they tried to eat while waves were crashing down on them every few seconds.  The tiny sand ones made holes in the sand and would pop out all paranoid every few seconds then hide again!

Farewell for now!