Category: Atenas

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An “Electric Blue” Thrush

It has been a similar problem with other photographs: MORNING SHADOWS in the trees. This original photo was more of a silhouette and of course the English name describes the bird accurately as “Clay-colored Thrush,” while my effort to remove the shadows left him more “electric blue.” 🙂

This is one bird that I prefer the Spanish name for, Yigüirro! I love just saying it and it’s not long until in April and May when he will be singing in the rains for the beginning of our rainy season! I can’t wait! I prefer the rainy (green) season! 🙂

An “Electric Blue” Thrush after my efforts to pull a Clay-colored one out of the shadows. 🙂

See what they really look like in my Clay-colored Thrush Gallery!

¡Pura Vida!

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Unidentified Insect

I have several insect books but none come close to including all the thousands of species here in Costa Rica and this one seen in my garden the other day is now number 40-something in my Unidentified Insects Gallery! 🙂

As always with any photo labeled “unidentified,” I welcome the help of any reader or visitor to my galleries. Just use the “Contact” button on the menu of this blog website or on my Gallery website also. It is frustrating to me to have photos without the proper identification.

Unidentified Insect, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica

¡Pura Vida!

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Villa Lapas

My second overnight trip after moving to Costa Rica nearly 10 years ago was to this locally-owned & operated lodge/hotel near the village of Tarcoles, less than an hour west of Atenas, Villa Lapas. I did not get many bird or other wildlife photos compared to later trips other places, but you can see what I got in my Trip Gallery: Villa Lapas, July 2015. The appeal then and now is that it is located next to Carara National Park, where, with a good guide (that I did not have then), you can photograph a lot of different bird species as you also can on the right Tarcoles River Boat Safari. Since then I’ve discovered lots of better lodges for birds and other nature photography (even in that area – see bottom of post), so why am I returning now? Because of a recent announcement about this little-known place with some rooms arranged as a “Colonial Spanish Jungle Village” becoming a Marriott Resort . . .

Villa Lapas set up as a “Colonial Jungle Village”
in the Transitional Forests of Carara National Park.
Continue reading “Villa Lapas”
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Cloudless Sulphur

An old regular is back! And in the next two months there will begin to be an increase in the number of butterflies with May-October the peak months for me or at least in my Atenas garden, roughly the same time as the rainy season. This Cloudless Sulphur, Phoebis sennae, is fairly common throughout the southern half of the USA down throughout Central America and the Caribbean Islands. One photo from my garden the other day:

Cloudless Sulphur, Atenas, Costa Rica

See more in my Clouded Sulphur Gallery.

¡Pura Vida!

And be sure to tune in tomorrow! I plan to tell you about my 3-day, 2-night adventure planned for Monday less than an hour from Atenas. One can have adventures close to home! 🙂

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2 Flowering Weeds

The next day after photographing them the gardeners cut them down with their weed eaters! 🙂 And NOTE for those receiving this as an email: All blog posts received in an email are BEST SEEN AND READ ONLINE by clicking the title above. Some design features are not carried over to the email version.

The first photo is a yellow & white daisy-like tiny flower that does attract the tiny butterflies and the second is some kind of whitish puff ball with a separate flower bud in front of it. The bud is probably of the same species as the yellow & white flower pictured, since it was close by. Even weeds have a beauty that can be photographed and several of my butterfly photos include such “weed flowers” never mentioned! 🙂

“Weed Flower,” Atenas, Costa Rica
Weed flower bud in front of a “puff ball” of another weed, Atenas, Costa Rica

For more plant photos, browse through my Flora & Forest Galleries.

¡Pura Vida!

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Romancing Doves

These two White-winged Doves, Zenaida asiatica, seemed to be cuddling in the first photo and closed-eyes kissing in the second photo. I never know what to expect next in my trees, but I have some pretty good photos in my White-winged Dove Gallery. 🙂 Read about them on eBird. They are just about everywhere in the Americas and the bird I am hearing the most this month.

White-winged Doves Romancing.
White-winged Doves Romancing.

¡Pura Vida!

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Inca Dove Couple

Appearing on one of my tree limbs looking like a loving married couple the other day were two Inca Doves, one of my favorite dove species with their “sculpted” look. You can read about them on eBird or check out some of my earlier photos in my Inca Dove Gallery. The scientific name is Columbina inca and they are found from Panama north through all of Central America and Mexico into much of the Southwestern USA. Here’s just one photo:

Inca Doves, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica

¡Pura Vida!

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Physalis “Chinese Lantern”

What I can find online (Wikipedia link) about this plant is that it is in the genus of Physalis, with “approximately 75 to 90 flowering plant species in the nightshade family (Solanaceae), which are native to the Americas and Australasia.” ~says Wikipedia

Variously call Chinese Lantern, Japanese Lantern, Bladder Cherry, Ground Cherry, Tomatillo (a red or gold fruit grows inside the lantern or bladder). I have seen them in other parts of Costa Rica and finally tried to research online. I won’t venture to guess which of the up to 90 species this particular plant is. 🙂

I made these 2 photos across the driveway from my garden, on my landlord’s property where they appear to be a wild vine climbing up another plant. I hope to eventually learn more about them. These two shots seem to show them at different stages of development.

Physalis Fruit, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica
Continue reading “Physalis “Chinese Lantern””