1 Dollar Flying Fish

Barbados has featured the flying fish on its coinage since decimalization in 1973, making it one of the most enduring national symbols in Caribbean numismatics — but the shift to bullion-format silver strikes in recent decades reflects the island's deliberate cultivation of a collector market rather than any change in monetary policy. The flying fish itself is so central to Barbadian identity that it became a point of diplomatic friction in the early 2000s, when a dispute with Trinidad over fishing rights in contested waters briefly escalated into what regional press dubbed the "flying fish war."