A Warwick Lizard (in Smith's)

The bright green high up in the poinciana tree caught my eye.

This type of lizard is called a 'Warwick Lizard' in Bermuda (properly, its a Barbados anole/Anolis leachii. It was introduced to Bermuda in the 1940's, originally in Warwick parish. They're gradually moving eastwards and in the last few years have become quite a common sight in Smiths.

Gold Crowned Night Heron

The morning light along John Smith's Bay catches the crowning feathers nicely

See it on the map

Spiders

A Golden Silk Spider looming up on a dainty Dew Drop Spider. In fact the dew drops spiders seem to co-exist happily with the golden silk spiders - it is the male golden silks which really have to fear for their lives!

Sanderling

Sanderling on South Shore. I'm not sure if these are migratory birds, but they're often seen dashing along just in front of the waves during the autumn months.

See it on the map

Closer

You can see why he's called a spiny orb weaver, and equally a crab spider!

Crab Spider

A crab spider (known as a spiny orb-weaver elsewhere) after a morning shower.

Lizard Babe

A baby Jamaican Anole that I saved from the clutches of my kitten's jaws! (Then willingly placed on a pretty hibiscus.)

These lizards are common sights in Bermuda, although they were introduced and form part of a long and faily silly chain: Fruit flies were a nuisance so the anole was introduced. But when a tiny cedar scale insect was introduced by mistake on imported Christmas trees and decimated the endemic Bermuda Cedar trees, no biologicial control could be established because of these lizards. So the yellow Kiskadee was introduced to take care of the lizards. Now these are the biggest problem - it turned out they didn't even like lizards that much but ate pretty much anything else.

Oh, and we still have fruit flies and the cedars sorted themselves out anyway with a resistant strain becoming dominant!

Hurricane Spider

Hurricane Spider, as the Golden Silk Spider is locally known.

It's said that you know a hurricane is coming if they start spinning webs low to the ground. When they're up high you know you'll be storm free for a while.