JOHNSTON: CAYMAN ISLAND AVIFAUNA


populations so that ecological models and generalizations might be more
rigorously tested, amended, or even rejected. Since complete data for
avian insular populations are particularly sparse, scattered in the litera-
ture, and often incomplete, the ecological model-builder or synthesizer
must consult a multitude of scientific papers by different authors, each
using different techniques and reporting usually single ecological param-
eters from widely different islands. For the entire complex of West
Indian Islands, not one island has yet been subjected to a thorough, com-
prehensive investigation of its avifauna, despite the distributional survey
by Bond (1971) and the general assessments of taxon cycles by Ricklefs
and Cox (1972).
 Accordingly, this report is an assemblage of published data, several
years of personal field experience and collecting, and a thorough analysis
of as many ecological parameters as possible for a single insular avifauna,
namely that of the three small isolated Cayman Islands. Attention is
focused on "standard" ecological parameters such as population densities,
competitive interactions, food and feeding behavior, reproductive cycles,
predation and other population controls, habitat and stratal distribution,
and secondary succession. Even this comprehensive report, which cor-
roborates and augments ideas from other insular studies, is admittedly
incomplete in one important aspect-the impact on resident bird popula-
tions by a large contingent of North American birds that overwinter in
these islands.





 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

 Through the years a number of organizations have provided financial support for
these investigations. They include a Biomedical Institutional Support Grant from the
Division of Sponsored Research of the University of Florida, the Bradley Fisk Fund,
the American Philosophical Society (Johnson Fund, Penrose Fund), and National
Science Foundation (GB-2114). Partial subsidy for publication came from the
Bradley Fisk Fund and the Division of Biological Sciences, University of Florida.
Assistance in field observations and collections came from Jon C. Barlow, Charles
H. Blake, Donald W. Buden, Alexander Cruz, Erma J. Fisk, and Albert Schwartz.
David May made the insect identifications and Albert Laessle most of the fruit and
seed identifications. Walter Auffenberg, Pierce Brodkorb, and Ronald Pine kindly
assisted in the identification of vertebrate prey items. I am particularly indebted to
Alexander Cruz, Daniel Simberloff, Carmine Lanciani, and Robert Ricklefs for spirited
and helpful discussions that shed much insight on ecological problems concerning
insular avifaunas. C. D. Hutchings, Chief Agricultural officer, and R. F. Pocock,
Chief of Police of the Cayman Islands, were both cooperative in many ways espe-
cially in the collecting of birds. Finally, of inestimable value has been the lifelong
field experiences of the islands' principal naturalist, Ira Thompson.