Goodnight from a Rainforest

Dark, damp, misting rain with no sunset as such but a trace of color as I eat my dinner at Playa Cativo overlooking the Gulf of Dulce on the Pacific coast of southern Costa Rica, while north of us Hurricane Bonnie is rushing across northern Costa Rica and Nicaragua and the handful of us here are thankful it didn’t veer south! 🙂

I saw and did a lot the first afternoon, but too tired to curate more photos now, so this rainforest report begins with a dark sky that will surely brighten as the week goes by. If not raining, I go on my birding hike at 5:30 in the morning and I got a head start with two pretty good photos today in the low light of a Great Curassow and a Scarlet-rumped Tanager.

And Of course I already like this place! 🙂 Later I’ll tell you about my beachside cabin and share photos from this nature-rich forest.

¡Pura Vida!

Playa Cativo Lodge Website

Fine-spotted Roadside Skipper

Fine-spotted Roadside Skipper or Amblyscirtes folia, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica

This Fine-spotted Roadside Skipper or Amblyscirtes folia is one of hundreds of “Skipper” butterflies. This one was photographed in my garden on June 20, 2022. I’ve been getting so many new butterflies this year that I’m having trouble keeping up with them all. There is very little about this species online in English with only a little in Spanish on Mexico and Ecuador sites that I won’t link here. I’m a new volunteer “coordinator” for Costa Rica on butterfliesandmoths.org and will soon get this fellow listed there, though I inherited a backlog of 450 submissions to go through and verify, so it may take a while! 🙂

Fine-spotted Roadside Skipper or Amblyscirtes folia, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica

See all my Costa Rica Butterflies Galleries for the amazing insect diversity here! At around 150 species, mine is the largest collection of just Costa Rica Butterflies & Moths I’ve found anywhere online. 🙂

And oh yes, this is the day I plan to be at Playa Cativo Lodge on the South Pacific coast of Costa Rica, so hopefully I make it and submit my first post from there tonight! 🙂 I just didn’t want to let this new butterfly discovery to wait around much longer! 🙂

¡Pura Vida!

Dusky-blue Groundstreak

Another “First Time Seen” butterfly for me, so I’m doing a second post today! 🙂 One of the “Hairstreak” butterflies, the Dusky-blue Groundstreak, Calycopis isobeon (link to butterflies & moths.org), is all over Costa Rica and another fingernail-sized butterfly! 🙂

I’m posting more butterflies than birds now partly because I haven’t had many birds in my garden and this is the time of year for more butterflies in Atenas is one reason. Another is that my interest in butterflies is going up and I have just become the “Costa Rica Coordinator” for the website butterfliesandmoths.org and since they haven’t had a CR Coordinator for 7 or more years here, I inherited a backlog of 450 submissions which will take months to go through, identify and approve while I’m anxious to submit my own 150 species photographed here. 🙂 I seem to always have plenty to keep me busy! 🙂 Enjoy this cool and different tiny butterfly and go outside and look for some where you live!

Dusky-blue Groundstreak, Atenas, Costa Rica
Continue reading “Dusky-blue Groundstreak”

Whirlabout – A New Butterfly!

Whirlabout, Polites vibex (link to butterfliesandmoths.org) is one of the many Skippers that is found from the SE United States south to Argentina including Mexico and all of Central America. But it is the first time I have photographed it. Here’s 4 shots and then you can see more in my new Whirlabout Gallery! 🙂

Whirlabout, Polites vibex, Atenas, Costa Rica
Continue reading “Whirlabout – A New Butterfly!”

Salome Yellow, Eurema salome

A couple more shots of the Salome Yellow Butterfly I introduced June 13. It seems that June is the time when I see more butterflies than birds in my gardens 🙂 , so until my trip (July 1), that’s what I’m posting about mostly! 🙂

Salome Yellow, Atenas, Costa Rica – It’s the 2 dots on top that identify him!
Continue reading “Salome Yellow, Eurema salome”

Cloudless Sulphur & Why Costa Rica?

Though this is a repeat butterfly for the blog, these are maybe better photos than I posted back in 2020 and again on June 15 this year with some doubt then of the ID, but I’m relatively certain now that these are Cloudless Sulphur Butterflies, Phoebis sennae, butterfliesandmoths.org link. They seem to be fairly common all over North America and that website will soon start showing them in Costa Rica! 🙂

Cloudless Sulphur, Atenas, Costa Rica
Continue reading “Cloudless Sulphur & Why Costa Rica?”

Two Different Swallowtails Sharing Flowers

Mid-morning as I walked through the garden, June 15, these two different species of Swallowtails were the only ones flitting around the flowers or mainly just the Porter Weeds. Neither are new to me and in fact you can see that I have better photos in their respective Photo Galleries:

Giant Swallowtail, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica
Polydamas Swallowtail, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica

And their top views . . .

Continue reading “Two Different Swallowtails Sharing Flowers”

This Lens

The host of My Photo Gallery is SmugMug.com and they regularly produce little short videos about photography or photographers and the little one they released this month shares in 3.5 minutes how four or fve different persons see their world through “This Lens” chronicling a growing family, promoting a cause, capturing nature like me and another the magic of outdoor sports. I thought it interesting enough to share on my blog:

My lens? I’ll just keep capturing the works of God through nature! 🙂

¡Pura Vida!

The feature photo by Tom Oakley is of me many years ago on a nature photography trip in Tennessee with the Nashville Photography Club. You can read more about the history of my love of photography after retirement on my Photography Page.

Esmeralda Longtail

This is my second year and third sighting of this butterfly in my garden over 7+ years which means he is not especially common also shown by the lack of reports online on the butterfly site. Many of the Longtail Skippers are very similar and have this bluish coloring on the body with the main difference being in the spots arrangement and the white fringe.

Esmeralda Longtail Skipper, Atenas, Costa Rica
Continue reading “Esmeralda Longtail”

Beauty in Death

The Bronzed Face of Death

The leaf of a Heliconia Flower dies in my garden and I see . . .

Trumpet
Pointing up
Graceful

Color
Burnished Bronze
Amply

Dying
Supportive
Green Leaf

Beauty
Forever 
In Death

Or the story in photos . . .

Continue reading “Beauty in Death”