Bird colony

[zafra52]

I took the picture at the Lacepede Islands, off the Kimberley coast of Western Australia, from a moving boat since you can't land in these islands; they are protected bird sanctuaries. These four islands were identified by BirdLife International as an Important Bird Area (IBA) because they support over 1% of the world populations of brown boobies and roseate terns. Breeding colonies of brown boobies (up to 18,000 breeding pairs) and roseate terns (up to 20,000) have been recorded. Other birds breeding on the islands are masked boobies, Australian pelicans, lesser frigatebirds, eastern reef egrets, silver gulls, crested, bridled and lesser crested terns, common noddies, and pied and sooty oystercatchers. Visiting waders include grey-tailed tattlers, ruddy turnstones, great knots and greater sand plovers.