Papagaios, Life & Times on a Speculative Archipelago

Extract from the diary of the author, broadcaster, politician, and diarist Édgar Cuervo O'Brien, who spent a large part of his later years in living on Milagres.

Sunday 14th May 1995

A lazy afternoon boating. Sailed from Porto Branco round the cape to a cove I've quite forgotten the name of, though I'm certain I once knew it.

A relaxing spot, no sign of humanity visible in any direction, though hardly quiet. Birds everywhere. Plunging marquinhets roost in the cliffs and occasionally live up to their name, dropping quickly into the water and returning with mouthfuls of fish. Their cousins the sunset marquinhets glide past, skimming the surface. More distantly related flightless species surface for air before diving back down to hunt among the rocks and plants.

There are other animals here too, albeit less abundant than the hundreds of seabirds. Lizards of all kinds scramble along the cliffs hunting for eggs, chicks, and other lizards in a complex web of predator and prey.

Some sort of land octopus slinks along the lower rocks, finding a place to lie in wait and ambush its prey. I swear I saw another octopus-like creature on the high cliffs, swinging from overhanging rocks, though I have never heard of such a creature before, and by the time I located my binoculars it had disappeared. Whether it vanished via camouflage, slipping into a crevice, or else returning to the ocean, I cannot say.

Late in the afternoon, I had finished my lunch and was grazing on a mix of fruits and nuts when a bird joined me on deck. A curious little fellow, he flew closer and pecked at a grape which had rolled from the plate. From his hummingbird-like appearance and our marine location, I recognised him as a reefbee, and a flick through my birder's guide informed me it was the lesser golden reefbee, formerly Godfrey's reefbee.

Birds in the Papagaios islands fall into two broad camps: those related to auks and puffins, and those related to songbirds. The reefbee is a member of the latter group, though as with many creatures here, they have taken to the water splendidly.

It is a small bird, no bigger than a wren, and with some species much smaller. In broad terms it resembles a hummingbird with a long narrow beak and proportionally small body. Its plumage is predominately golden-yellow, accentuated with black on the wings, crown, tail, and throat, along with white detail on its stomach and brows. Two remarkable feathers curl up from the in front of the eyes on long stalks, resembling a pair of antennae. All told, the bird’s colouration, size, and appearance all lend to its “bee” name, though that is in truth derived from its behaviour.

With a chirrup, my friend flew back to the water, hovered for but a moment and then plunged into the water below. Never having seen a reefbee in the wild I was overwhelmed by excitement and (forgetting my age) grabbed a snorkel and dove in after him.

The sea grass meadow rolled out below me like the fields of Elysium. Fish, birds and reptiles of all sorts darted here and there. My friend swam down towards the grass, using his small, stubby wings just as much as his feet whose wide, flat toes are outrageously large for a bird so small. I’d wager that in a few million years he could evolve into a four-flippered aquatic creature, using all four limbs to swim in a most unusual form of locomotion.

The tiny bird must be entirely lung on the inside, or else have prodigious quantities of haemoglobin to allow it to spend upwards of five minutes underwater.

A few feet above the grass, he stops, hovering if you will in the water. A moment passes while his head turns this way and that, then he’s off again, his target – a small pink flower.

Sea grass is a true grass and therefore a flowering plant. Most release their pollen directly into the ocean. This species does do that, but it also produces small pink flowers. Nearly microscopic crustaceans swim between them, eating pollen, but it also sticks to them, and they carry it to other plants. As the crustaceans visit only the healthiest plants, this method produces generally healthier offspring than dispersing pollen via the currents, but there is greater diversity among the current-pollinated plants, and so both methods persist for now.

The reefbee also feeds from the sea grass’ flowers, but pollen is not its main food. To better catch pollen floating in the water, the flowers produce a sticky secretion. This secretion happens to be sweet-tasting and rich in nutrients. Those plants that produce the best secretions are most visited by the reefbees and so more often pollinated. This has resulted in a species of sea grass that produces prodigious quantities of this ‘sea nectar’ to increase its attractiveness to reefbees.

A duck-sized distant cousin darts by, chasing a small fish. Losing its quarry, it nibbles at a nearby grass flower, perhaps hinting at how the reefbees got their start. While musing on this, my friend finished his meal and moved on.

I wish him well.