The Rock Slater or Sea Roach is a type of isopod which lives on the coastline. It’s related to pillbugs and sowbugs, which are also isopods, and there are also a large number of marine isopods, some of which are fish parasites (I often see these attached to the gills of grunts when snorkeling or diving). I don’t know any […]

The Pantropical Jumper is one of two similar species of jumping spider that are widespread in much of the tropical and subtropical world, the other is the Gray Wall Jumper. At home, I have the Gray Wall Jumper everywhere, but I’ve only seen the Pantropical Jumper at University of St. Martin. Like all jumping spiders, they hunt for prey on […]

A turnip-tailed gecko’s foot has small plates, called lamellae, and on them there are setae, which are fine hairs that help the gecko hold onto surfaces, allowing it to walk on walls and tree trunks. On St. Martin, these geckos are called Woodslaves, and there are two closely-related species, one of which lives only on St. Martin.

Here’s a tree cricket from the genus Oecanthus. Like some of our frogs, the most reliable way to distinguish some species in the field is by the chirping of the male, because multiple species look almost identical. There’s also a smaller insect, perhaps a bark louse, in the photo. When reviewing my photos on the computer, I often find tiny […]

When people say there aren’t so many birds on St. Martin, they’re right in many ways. There are 150 species ever recorded on the island, including rare vagrants seen only once or a few times, which is not a lot of species. Also, there are not very many species that hang out around people. Anyone not looking for birds on […]

There are many beautiful flies on St. Martin, but I think the micropezid flies are my favorite. I find them only in the forest, most often around Pic Paradis and Colombier. I have found almost no information about the micropezids we have on St. Martin, but many species from this family are wasp mimics, and a few are wingless ant-mimics. […]

There are at least a few different termite species on St. Martin, and to be honest I haven’t figured out how to identify them yet. One interesting thing I have learned about them is that they have recently been reclassified because we have discovered that they are very closely related to cockroaches. It is perhaps a bit of an oversimplification, […]

An immature yellow-crowned night heron at Salines de l’aéroport in Grand Case. Even before they get their distinctive head plumage and “crown” they are easy to identify by their stocky body and thick bill. I’ve seen a number of nests in the bushes on Petite Clef, the little island on the way to Pinel.

I love the color of these grasshoppers when they are young. Nymphs (immature stages of an insect that doesn’t go through a complete metamorphosis) of the grasshoppers from this genus (Schistocerca) are usually bright green, while the adults are typically brown. This genus of grasshoppers are also known as locusts, because when the conditions are right they will form swarms. […]

Here’s a female jumping spider hiding in a palm frond. At times I’ve seen five or six species of spider living in the fronds of a single palm tree, and there are probably more than that on some. Although they aren’t as diverse as insects, there are still probably several hundred species of spiders on St. Martin, easily enough for […]