Land of the Living - Nevis Animals and Sea Life

Here is the sixth installment of articles in memory of Jim Johnson (www.WalkNevis.com) who died tragically on Nevis recently. We are re-publishing a series of his articles over the coming weeks. Each one gives a fascinating insight into the man, his love of Nevis and his infinite knowledge of natural life on this beautiful Caribbean island.


While Nevis is quiet and relaxed, with our gentle breezes and calm waters, we are very much alive and could be easily referred to as the Land of the Living! Nevis is packed and full of life, it is just not of a really loud and vocal nature!

Those long sandy beaches and rolling waves have a wide range of coastal and sea life. Ghost crabs hide in the sand and scurry into the waves to lay their eggs. Cockles bury themselves in the tidal zone. Coral reefs harbour thousands of types of fish, shell creatures, sponges, and sea fans as well as crabs, lobsters, octipi and baby turtles.

Overhead, quietly soaring around is a wide variety of coastal birds. Terns don’t fuss as much as gulls and you will rarely hear a squawk for our pelicans. The magnificent Frigatebirds look like small Pterodactyls, but say little.

Inland there are hummingbirds, banana quits, flycatchers and much more, but mostly active at dawn and dusk and even then not too loud. Also fluttering around with the birdlife are brightly coloured butterflies, moths, and beetles, none of which make a sound. They help our beautiful flowers and plants reproduce another wide category of life on Nevis.

Our noisy neighbours? Check out the frogs at night, that is the mating call of the males saying “Honey, I’m available”. Egrets and monkeys can sometimes be heard making guttural noises as the look for food and argue who is in charge. And then there are donkeys, scare a donkey and you will hear about it for at least five minutes (so just don’t scare them)!

Nevis is very much alive, just quietly going about it.

For more information please see our Definitive Caribbean Guide to Nevis.

Talking Tiny - The National Flower of Nevis

Here is the fifth installment of articles in memory of Jim Johnson (www.WalkNevis.com) who died tragically on Nevis recently. We are re-publishing a series of his articles over the coming weeks. Each one gives a fascinating insight into the man, his love of Nevis and his infinite knowledge of natural life on this beautiful Caribbean island.


The hotels and private homes have some really beautiful flowers that are big and showy. The “National Flower” of the Federation is a large spreading tree that towers 30 feet tall! One of our wild flowers has a single bud that is over 12 inches (30 cm) tall. But the bulk of flora and fauna is not quite so big and showy, look closely and see the small!

Look at the wild areas alongside our roads, it is filled with numerous tiny white, yellow, red and even blue flowers! Blue Rain Eyes peep out after an afternoon shower. Pink Paint Brushes hide in the weeds (they often are the weeds) and mix with multicoloured lantanas.

Then there are the flowers that try to look big, but aren’t. Bougainvillea flowers form shrubs and Poinsettias tower like trees at Golden Rock, but those bright colours aren’t the flowers, they are modified leaf-bracts! The flowers are in the center and tiny, less than ¼ of an inch across!

Then there are the native animals. Some giant moths are found, but tiny brilliant butterflies are the most frequently seen. The “large noise” at night is a small tree frog with a backbone just over 1/3 inch (9 mm). The most delicate lizard species is also one of the smallest now, check out the tiny geckos! Our Hummingbirds dart all around and most count them as small, but for hummers they are actually quite big.

Take some time to appreciate the wonders of Nevis, but look closely to see it all!

For more information please see our Definitive Caribbean Guide to Nevis.

Natural Spread on Nevis, Birds, Bats and Beetles.

Here is the fourth installment of articles in memory of Jim Johnson (www.WalkNevis.com) who died tragically on Nevis recently. We are re-publishing a series of his articles over the coming weeks. Each one gives a fascinating insight into the man, his love of Nevis and his infinite knowledge of natural life on this beautiful Caribbean island.


Nevis is home to many strange and fascinating creatures of all shapes and sizes. Flowers and ferns abound, Bats, butterflies and birds fly overhead during the day and at night. How did they get here? Where did they come from? Where are most of the mammals?

What we are referring to is Nevis’ natural spread. This means the thousands of different plant species, hundreds of brightly coloured moths, butterflies, and beetles, all the birds, and even the bats.

First is getting here, they didn’t take a plane and we don’t think they were teleported by aliens from Outer Space (though we reserve this as an option). If you were to go back in time 20,000 years, the islands were bigger and easier to get between. This was during the last Ice Age and the sea levels were at least 300 feet lower. St. Kitts and Nevis were truly one, as were many places now separated. The plants and animals floated, swam, or flew from one place to the next. Thus most of our natural species are similar to South America (this is the direction most currents or winds go).

We didn’t get everything as many plants and animals have symbiotic relationships with each other. If you got one without the other, it couldn’t survive!

As for many of the animals, including the large mammals, when the oceans started to rise, they died off. Not only massive storms, but smaller territories and restricted food supplies (One jaguar requires 20,000 acres, 2 need more than all of Nevis). The larger predators probably ate all their prey, then died off themselves, the bones would have dissolved into our volcanic soil!

Many later evolved into unique species. So go out and enjoy our natural spread!

For more information please see our Definitive Caribbean Guide to Nevis.

Searching for Sulphur on Nevis - Yellow Butterflies!

Here is the third installment of articles in memory of Jim Johnson (www.WalkNevis.com) who died tragically on Nevis recently. We are re-publishing a series of his articles over the coming weeks. Each one gives a fascinating insight into the man, his love of Nevis and his infinite knowledge of natural life on this beautiful Caribbean island.


This doesn’t mean searching for sulphur, that yellow compound used for making gunpowder and skin creams, but rather looking at all those little yellow butterflies that seem so prominent on Nevis. And they are Sulphurs, Sulphur butterflies!

Sulphurs are by far the most common butterfly found on Nevis and probably in the entire Caribbean Region. They are not just one species, but a whole family and, like families, have a wide range of sizes and colours. There are over 20 estimated types of Sulphurs found on Nevis.

Most are yellow with some type of black markings. Orange-barred Sulphers (three types) are generally larger in size and mostly yellow, but have orange spots or stripes. The smaller yellows seem to mainly be Hall’s Sulphur with a black lining around the outside of the wing.

But then there are White Sulphers, Great White Sulphers, and Florida White Sulphurs! These again are often hard to sort out by a “nonspecialist”, and should not be confused with “White Peacocks”. Some Sulphurs are green!

Sulphur caterpillars are green with yellow stripes and feed on a wide range of plants. They like water and adults can actually drink salt water, so are sometimes found out at sea migrating from one island to the other!

So why not go search for some sulphur!?

For more information please see our Definitive Caribbean Guide to Nevis.