Category: Birds

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Cabanis’s Wren + 5

I left about 5:30 this morning for a walk to help me shape up for the coming week of hikes and to maybe get some birds on the hill above my house, always hoping for a “lifer” or first time bird. It was cool and very foggy and so I wrote my first blog post on the fog which I’ve already scheduled for tomorrow morning.

THEN I went through my bird photos and found that I did indeed get a “lifer” this morning, even if not a good photo. It is the featured photo, a Cabanis’s Wren (eBird article link) in bad light and too far away with lots of limbs and leaves, but I got it! 🙂 Another new bird in my gallery and that now makes 5 different wrens and a total of 344 identified birds in Costa Rica plus a few unidentified ones. So a nice surprise this morning in my neighborhood. All the other birds today are fairly common, except maybe the Yellow-faced Grassquit which I have photographed in two other places (better photos) plus one juvenile here earlier.

  • Gray-capped Flycatcher
  • Clay-colored Thrush or Yigüirro
  • Cabanis’s Wren
  • Yellow-faced Grassquit
  • Variable Seedeater
  • White-winged Dove
My morning walk birds today. CLICK image to enlarge.

¡Pura Vida!

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Xandari GALLERY #4 Published

The “4” can mean my 4th trip to Xandari or the 4th Gallery on Xandari or the fact that I was there for 4 days this time! 🙂 The featured photo is on my walk to the restaurant from my villa.

It is a magical getaway every visit and I tend to photograph many new things or the same things in different ways each time, like this time I didn’t even hike to the waterfalls but spent more time with flowers & butterflies and a feature on the bamboo forest. So if considering a visit to Xandari, check out each of my photo galleries from 4 different trips there with 4 different perspectives:

  • 2020 August 21-24 – A Weekend Retreat during a World Pandemic with masks & solo activities in nature. Most butterflies & flowers this time.
  • 2020 January 12-16 – Five days when I installed my photo books library and photographed all kinds of nature with more birds than above.
  • 2019 July 1-6 – My birthday week with them providing a cake and great celebration and me making another different set of nature photos all over. A very good week! Or see the Photo Book, Brilliant! My Birthday Week at Xandari!
  • 2018 July 14-18 – My first trip to Xandari and maybe my most photos as I was thrilled with the discovery in every way! Or see the Photo Book, Xandari – Enchanted by Nature

¡Pura Vida!

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Bewitching Birds

Merriam-Webster defines “bewitching” as “powerfully or seductively attractive or charming” which well-describes the effect of over 900 species of birds in Costa Rica on me, along with my love of alliterations! 🙂

I usually photograph more birds than this at Xandari, but with rain and fog blanketing that mountain most of the time this past weekend, I got usable photos of only 9 species, but as indicated yesterday, I made up the difference with butterflies and flowers! 🙂 I’m never without something to photograph at Xandari! 🙂

No new species this time, but as always, I love trying to get a different view, perspective, or activity of a bird to make my bird galleries more interesting. CLICK image to enlarge.

  • Melodious Blackbird
  • Rufous-tailed Hummingbird
  • Keel-billed Toucan
  • Rufous-naped Wren
  • Turkey Vulture
  • Lesson’s Motmot
  • Great Kiskadee
  • Keel-billed Toucan
  • White-eared Ground-Sparrow
  • Gray-headed Chachalaca
Whether perching, flying, eating or singing, they continue to bewitch me!

Meet some of the Xandari family . . .

AND . . . They treat me like family! I love this place and these people!

Xandari Nature Resort

¡Pura Vida!

I return to my home in Atenas today but will have more posts about this weekend trip to Xandari and a gallery of the best photos from the weekend posted by the end of the week. In the meantime you might be interested in some of my other Costa Rica Travel galleries at CR Trips. Some of my Tico friends tell me that I’ve seen more of their home country than they have. I love it all!

🙂

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Adding to the Charlie Doggett Library

This weekend I go to Xandari Nature Resort near Alajuela, which is the only place in Costa Rica that you can see all of my Costa Rica Photo Books, other than at my house. I installed the library of photo books in January there for the benefit of their guests and this weekend I will be adding two more books, the only ones made since January for all of Costa Rica. (I also did a photo book on my Roca Verde neighborhood birds, but figure that is too narrow a focus, but may decide to take one of those too.)

Two new books for the Charlie Doggett Photo Library at Xandari Resort.

¡Pura Vida!

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Impulsive Weekend Plans

Doing some things on impulse is part of being retired in Costa Rica I think and I’m tired of being cooped up at home in Atenas. One of my favorite nearby get-a-ways announced they were open on weekends only for now with special discounted prices, so I took the bait and will go to Xandari Nature Resort this weekend, an hour away, Friday afternoon to Monday morning; to hike their forests, waterfalls and most beautiful gardens. Hope to get some good photos and will avoid group hikes or any other interactions with people, eating alone, maybe even relaxing in their solo hot tub by reservation. But mainly some new nature experiences, some with my mask and face shield as we continue to fight the spread of COVID19 here. I will stay safe! And I forgot to say yesterday that I now have my “Permanent Residency” in Costa Rica! 🙂

The feature photo today is one of the sunsets from my last visit to Xandari in January.

Retired in Costa Rica!

¡Pura Vida!

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White-winged Dove

This is the most common or most frequently seen dove or pigeon in my garden. (The Inca Dove is the second most common in my garden.) To learn more about White-winged Doves, see The Cornell Lab “All About Birds” Article. Or White-winged Dove Gallery for more of my photos of this regular visitor to my garden. In this photo he is perched on the stump of a tree top where my Yellow Bell Tree was recently pruned so I can maintain my terrace vista.

¡Pura Vida!

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Through the eyes of a child . . .

The subtitle of my newest travel book is “When you look through the eyes of a child” describing how I tried to present this photo-travel book on Maquenque Eco-Lodge and Reserve. Yes – it is in Spanish this time but for you English-only people, don’t worry! All the photo captions are in both languages and the poem from which I got the subtitle is also in both languages, and here it is in English:

“Everything seemed possible,
when I looked through the eyes of a child.
And every once in a while;
I remember,
I still have the chance to be that wild.”
― Nikki Rowe

It’s a photo book with 141 photos, including photos of the 61 species of birds I got this visit. THE ELECTRONIC PREVIEW IS FREE, so go to this link or click the cover image below and you can see all 92 pages of the book for free! Of course full-screen is best for photos! 🙂

https://www.blurb.com/b/10228384-maquenque-m-gico

In English: “Maquenque Magic, When you look through the eyes of a child, by Charlie Doggett”

Or just for the downloadable photos, go to my “Trip Gallery” titled:

2020 June 30–July 6- Maquenque Eco-Lodge & Reserve

¡Pura Vida!

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Birds from Morning Walk

My hour and twenty minutes walk up the hill and back this morning provided many creativity opportunities as always! I almost overloaded this post with 4 categories of photos but will save the others for the next 3 days: butterflies, flowers and vistas. Today please enjoy the 8 birds I photographed. CLICK image to enlarge. Pura vida!

  • Turquoise-browed Motmot
  • White-winged Dove
  • Melodious Blackbird
  • Gray-crowned Yellowthroat
  • Red-billed Pigeon
  • Great Kiskadee
  • Rufous-naped Wren
  • Clay-colored Thrush or Yigüirro

See also my BIRDS photo gallery.

¡Pura Vida!

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Tanagers & Flycatchers

My last bird post from Maquenque is two of the largest and most frequently seen groups of birds – Flycatchers and the more colorful Tanagers. Enjoy! And to see all of the bird species I saw on this trip to Maquenque, go to the Maquenque 2020 BIRDS Gallery or better yet, see all my June-July 2020 Maquenque Photos! 🙂

Below, please CLICK an image to enlarge.

  • Palm Tanager Immature
  • Gray-capped Flycatcher
  • Scarlet-rumped Tanager Female
  • Great Kiskadee
  • Scarlet-rumped Tanager Male
  • Blue-gray Tanager
  • Social Flycatcher in Hard Rain
  • Palm Tanager Baby

See my Maquenque Birds 2020 Gallery from this trip with 61 species!

See also my Costa Rica Birds Gallery. 343 species!

And for more about the place: Maquenque Eco-Lodge & Reserve Website.

Or my travel gallery Maquenque Eco-Lodge July 2020 Visit.

And a new website: Visit Boca Tapada with info on all the lodges there.

And now I’ll get back to photos and reports about life here in Atenas, Costa Rica where everyday life is far from boring! 🙂

¡Pura Vida!