UCNH - birding and academic hotspot!

Hispaniolan parakeet - endemic, threatened

One hour west of Cap Haitien, off of Rt 1, sits a university whose founders and subsequent presidents prohibited cutting of trees (directions here). Today Université Chrétienne du Nord d'Haïti (UCNH) and the surrounding area of Haut Limbe is home to over 30 species of birds, and is a relaxing place to enjoy large trees full of lianas, bromeliads, and other life you’d expect to see in a tropical forest. Parakeets fly by every day and sometimes hang out on campus, warblers make it their winter home, and woodpeckers, palmchats, red-tailed hawks, and banaquits raise their families here. If you are up for a hike, there are great views from the surrounding hills and you might see a loggerhead kingbird, merlin, or plain pigeon. See here for list of birds.

UCNH also has a snack shop, copy center, bookstore (academic books in French), and library. Agronomy students have a plant nursery on campus, and you can visit a cacao grove and learn about chocolate. Perhaps while visiting you’ll get to see a performance by the fine arts students. Contact me if you’d like to set up a tour and a budding ecotourism student can show you around and take you birding, or to see cacao and plantain/banana groves.

Red-tailed hawk on campus

Plain pigeon - endemic, threatened

White-necked crow - endemic, threatened

Louisiana waterthrush

Hispaniolan lizard-cuckoo - endemic