Holiday to Bird island in the Seychelles

After 30 mintues of flying, Bird Island is in sight and the pilot makes a circling approach to the grass runway in the center of the island. We finally reach the air terminal, that is within a walking distance from the lodge.

During low tide in Bird Island, it is quite easy (depending on season) to spot baby shark swimming very close to the beach.

I continue to walk on the island. On the left, the grass runway of the airport. On the right, an immense white sand beach with no footprints from other humans.

Photos of Bird Island vegetation: a forest growing on some parts of the inner island.

But the real superstart of Bird Island is Esmeralda, a giant tortoise of an estimated age of about 200 years and a weight of 298 kilos. Although his name, he is actually a male and he is probably one of the world's oldest tortoise currently living.

Jeremy Radiate Tortoise is usually hard to be located because of its size (just a bit more than a coconut) and because she prefer to stay hidden in the shadow for most of the time. On the left picture, the carapace is damaged because she had an accident: a lot of years ago, when this island was used for copra production, she was confused for a coconut and "harvested" using kind of pickaxe.

A turtle that I didn't see before. I don't know how that Noddie chicks went on the turtle's leg and why... and also why the turtle went inside the pool...

Bird Island hosts anually a colony of about one million and an half of Sooty Terns, coming here to feed and then to grow the chicks. Normally they arrive in February: at this time of the year, they just fly over the island, until April, when they start to land after sunset. In May they begin to land also during the day and the chicks are born and feeded in the summer months. In October, they will go away and will disappear until the next February. Observing the colony is breathtaking, the most impressive thing is how much loudy they are!

In these pictures, a Tropicbird is incubating the eggs at the foot of a big tree (on the left), while Fairy Terns are having a rest on a big tree (on the right).

The Fairy Tern is another very common bird here.

On Bird Island, birds are of course everywhere. After the breakfast, the table is assaulted by a lot of birds, which will eat all my remainders in less than a minute.

Other typical birds of Bird Island.

At the dawn, the entire Seychelles archipelago was hit by a violent tropical storm, totally unusual for this period of the year. A big tree went down, damaging part of the roof of the lodge's resturant.

I then enter a narrow trail in the forest and I see something terrible. Dozens of chicks, most of them already dead, stands on the ground, probably after falling from their nests because of the wind. I don't know if they survived, I've observed them for quite long time, but no adult did come here to feed them.

Other chicks rambling on the ground.

I continue to walk, turning around the island and soon I discover that, near Passe Cocos, what two days ago was looking like the picture on the left, today is almost totally covered by a thick layers of seaweeds, probably carried here by the combined action of wind, tide and ocean's currents.

On Bird Island there is only one luxury resort, quite pricey. On the left picture, a bungalow at Bird Island Resort, at least as it was in year 2003. On the right picture, a geko in the bungalow eating so many insects.