charliedoggett.net
The White-winged Dove (eBird) is one of my faithful regularly seen birds in my garden. Here is in a Yellow Bell Tree behind my house. I also have quite a few photos in my White-winged Dove GALLERY, including what I think was my first bird to photograph here the hour I arrived for a birding tour in 2009. 🙂
¡Pura Vida!
It seems to be taking me longer to complete my trip galleries – just a slow old man! 🙂
But one reason was that it is slow identifying 32 species of butterflies (several new to me), 29 species of birds (1 lifer), and 13 species of other wildlife with lots of nice frog shots this time! These trip galleries are my main photo galleries to which I link for photos in the bird, butterfly and other subject galleries. If you are considering different lodges in Costa Rica as a visitor or one who lives here and travels like me, these trip galleries are a good source of real information about what you can see in a particular place. Enjoy!
Or click this linked address: https://charliedoggett.smugmug.com/TRIPS/2022-December-22-28-Arenal-Observatory-Lodge
¡Pura Vida!
My last 4 species of birds from Arenal Observatory are in 5 photos because the Red-legged Honeycreeper male & female are so different, with only their legs matching! 🙂
With 4 birds in today’s post and 4 more tomorrow I will have shared all that I got useable photos of on the Christmas trip. And no, I got no “lifers” or first-time seen birds on this trip, but that is expected when you have photos of more than 359 species of birds in Costa Rica! It’s getting harder to find a new species! 🙂
Yes, I’m still working on all my photos from Arenal, but with so few Toucans in my Guarumo Tree this year, I had to share this afternoon’s rapid stop by two Keel-billed Toucans to snack on some Cecropia Flowers before flying off to wherever they spend the night! 🙂
¡Pura Vida!
And you might enjoy my Keel-billed Toucan GALLERY.
Trying to group birds by size is not real accurate, but now it leaves me with 4 “smaller” birds for tomorrow and 4 others for the next day! 🙂 Then I will get on to other wildlife and the many butterflies photographed at Arenal Observatory!
Yes, you can sometimes see a hawk at Arenal Observatory, but I did not this time nor the two larger toucans, Keel-billed and Yellow-throated, which I have every other visit. But these 5 are still impressive birds and there’s six photos because the male and female of the Great Curassow are so different. I debated about putting the Collared Aracari here, since he’s the smaller toucan, but he seemed too big for the “medium birds” post that’s next. 🙂 And despite their bad reputations, both vultures are beautiful (when flying) and so important to the ecology of our lands!
As usual, one photo for the emailed notice with the others in the online post . . .
Possibly my favorite bird seen at Arenal Observatory Lodge with the only other place seen so far being at Esquinas Rainforest Lodge at Piedras Blancas National Park near Golfito. The rich colors make this bird very attractive though he/she tends to stay behind the limbs and leaves of trees with berries, thus difficult to photograph! 🙂
Three more shots below including one eating a berry, plus you can see my other shots of this bird in my Bay-headed Tanager GALLERY! I love my growing collection of Costa Rica birds! 🙂
This was my fourth time to visit Arenal Observatory Lodge (link to lodge website) and the second time as my annual “Christmas Getaway!” The first two days we had a lot of rain & wind unlike the other Christmas visit and I thought it was not going to be a good place for Christmas this year, but then Christmas Day was a bright blue-sky, sunshiny day and we had a mixture of weather my remaining 4 nights there, and though I initially thought I didn’t see as much wildlife, I actually did pretty good with 27 species of birds and more butterflies and “other wildlife” than before! So – No big toucans or monkeys! I had a lot of other wildlife and some of my best frog photos plus more butterflies! 🙂
Also, I had less energy than on the previous trips here (cancer recovery is slow) and I scheduled no early-morning guided bird walk like usual, so to have 27 birds on my own is okay! 🙂 And I will be sharing those bird and butterfly photos in future days on this blog when I finally get them organized.
So . . . YES! I continue to rate Arenal Observatory Lodge as one of the best places in Costa Rica for birds and for my nature fix AND also for the lodge services with an excellent room and gourmet food, surrounded by one of the largest rainforests in the country! And yes, it is not cheap, but worth what you pay in my opinion. Superb guides, the best of other services, plus the best maintained wilderness trails that are featured below in this post, a birding tower, a big waterfall, and more birds, butterflies and trails than almost anywhere else! So yes – I will return to Arenal Observatory Lodge! But next time I’m going in May again, for the beautiful sunsets over the lake every night, and maybe monkeys then! 🙂 I think the sun moves further south this time of year, putting the sunset behind the mountains, but in May, it’s right over the lake! 🙂
Below is a Gallery of some rainforest trails at Arenal Observatory, then links to the photo galleries of my other 3 previous visits with a comparison of birds and other wildlife photographed. 🙂