Category: Wildlife

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Why I Make Photos . . .

“Practice any art . . . not to get money and fame, but to experience becoming, to find out what’s inside you, to make your soul grow.” ~Kurt Vonnegut

And that quote, I just found, describes exactly what I am doing with my photography, with this blog, and with me being “Retired in Costa Rica!” I am becoming, discovering and growing. Living in and focusing on nature is my idea of life now, “almost heaven.” 🙂

The feature photo of a Red-eyed Tree Frog in the hand of another nature explorer at Aguila de Osa Lodge, Drake Bay, is an example of what lights up my life! As is the frog on the cover of my latest photo book below, photographed with my simple cell phone at the Danta Corcovado Lodge, Los Patos Ranger Station, Corcovado National Park. Frogs are almost as dear to me as birds! 🙂

One of my most fun creations yet: Animal Faces.

My Photo Gallery

becoming, discovering and growing

¡Pura Vida!

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Today’s Birds

Close to home I usually photograph my most birds along the 1 km or so up the hill from my house. Today I met a neighbor to show her where I find them and we spotted or recognized a minimum of 12 species. Here’s photos of 8, having no good photos of female Blue-black Grassquit, Hoffman’s Woodpecker, White-winged Dove and Inca Dove. The two doves I have so many photos of I just didn’t even try to photograph today. 🙂 The featured image is an immature Tropical Kingbird which is fairly common all over Costa Rica. CLICK an image below to enlarge and/or start a manual slide show.

  • Blue-gray Tanager
  • Tropical Kingbird
  • Red-billed Pigeon
  • Barred Antshrike
  • Great Kiskadee
  • Stripe-headed Sparrow
  • Blue-black Grassquit Male
  • Tennessee Warbler

See all my BIRDS galleries from many countries or just Costa Rica Birds if you prefer! 🙂

If one way be better than another, that you may be sure is nature’s way.

—Aristotle

¡Pura Vida!

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Enjoying a “Thank You”

I do a little 7 X7 inch photo book on almost every lodge I visit in Costa Rica and send a copy to the hotel and/or the guides. After my September trip to El Silencio Lodge & Reserve I sent two such books to the hotel along with a copy of my CR Birds Book & one of my CR Butterflies Book for their guests to enjoy.

One of the guides sent me a What’s App message “Thank You” yesterday afternoon with the above photo of my two El Silencio guides, Daniel & Bryan, holding a copy of the El Silencio Book. Nice to be appreciated! 🙂 Thanks guys!

¡Pura Vida!

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Covid Cancels Another Trip

My November trip was going to be a repeat to another favorite birding location, Rancho Humo on the Tempisque River at Palo Verde National Park with the nearest town 30+ minutes away, Nicoya. It is a quiet, peaceful rural retreat with luxury rooms and meals on a ranch that still had 800 head of cattle the last time I was there. Featured photo is a White-faced Capuchin Monkey is from my one visit there. It’s a great retreat for couples, families, or anyone wanting peace and quiet in nature, plus the real draw is birds for me, with one of the heavier concentration of birds in the country, especially inland water birds and one of only 2 places here where you might see the rare Jabiru Stork. I saw just one my last visit there.

A month ago they told me they planned to reopen November 1 when our borders are open to all countries for the first time since March. The entry requirements no longer include a negative Covid19 test, but still require sufficient medical insurance, masks, social distancing, etc. But tourists aren’t storming our borders and to make it worse, the U.S. Embassy recommends not traveling here because there is a new wave of the virus here like almost everywhere else. Gloomy – especially for the tourism businesses!

Thus Rancho Humo decided to not open and I had to cancel my reservation which fortunately was not pre-paid like some hotels are requiring now. But I’m still disappointed.

I will keep busy locally with walks and photography and continue my website & photo gallery building, so still a happy retiree in Costa Rica! 🙂 And I may even have Walter (my driver) take me on a couple of Water Fall Day Trips. We will see.

I’m still booked for Arenal Observatory for Christmas and they are open now, so I don’t anticipate any problem there. It is listed as one of the “Birding Hot Spots” of Costa Rica and is one of my top 5 favorite lodges, so I know that Christmas will be good and in the wilderness again! 🙂 And by the way, lodges like this take extra precautions because of the pandemic to keep everything sanitized and people masked and socially distanced, plus I spend most of my time solo hiking in the wilderness, so little chance of getting the virus. And just look at what I see from my sanitized room there:

Arenal Volcano View from My Room — same room each time — I love it! 🙂

¡Pura Vida!

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Magical AFRICA

My last three years of working full time were in The Gambia, with visits to other West African countries like Senegal and Cote d’Ivoire. Plus I made three two-week long trips to Kenya & Tanzania that included two safaris in The Masai Mara, meaning I have a lot of Africa photos! 🙂

Thus I self-curated 139 photos for a beautiful little 7X7 inch photo book titled Magical AFRICA in 102 pages with the hardcover edition including premium lustre photo paper. This is my first book of Africa photos in my Blurb Bookstore and is a general “Portfolio” book.

Click the above linked title or cover image and as always, you can thumb through the book electronically by clicking on REVIEW and pages to turn them.

Another COVID19 benefit of being limited from much travel during the pandemic! 🙂

“One cannot resist the lure of Africa.”
– Rudyard Kipling

¡Pura Vida!

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One of 890 Species of Ants

Yep! That’s how many different kinds of ants we have in Costa Rica and I have no idea which species this one is, but not sure I’ve noticed him around my house before. The leaf-cutters are the most identifiable, always carrying a piece of leaf or flower, and I’ve shown them on the blog multiple times. This little guy was on the railing of my terrace two mornings ago. They are all interesting! Until they come in the house, I leave them alone and they leave me alone. 🙂

My GALLERY of Other Insects or of Leafcutter Ants

This one goes in the “Unidentified” Sub-Gallery there.

¡Pura Vida!

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Ant Carries Leaf

I’m not positive that this is a Leafcutter Ant, though they are usually the ones carrying leaves like this or pieces of leaves. But they are usually a group of hundreds marching in a line like a well trained army! This guy was solo and when he go to my doormat at entrance to my terrace, he did not go around but marched right over it, moving to the left, holding the leaf in his mouth! The ant house is underground next to my terrace.

The little things in nature can keep you occupied for hours if you wanted! 🙂

“If an ant carries an object a hundred times its weight, you can carry burdens many times your size.”

― Matshona Dhliwayo

¡Pura Vida!

See my Leafcutter Ants gallery.

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New Phone APP: Animals of Costa Rica

For my fellow nature-lovers in Costa Rica or ones who travel here frequently, you may want to check this out . . . Animals of Costa Rica

Thanks to the El Silencio Guide (Eco Concierge) Daniel for introducing me to a new source of identifying my wildlife photos. I haven’t used it enough to have a strong opinion yet. The one unknown butterfly I tried to find on it, I couldn’t, so like all my other ID sources, it will not be perfect or totally complete, but it is my first source to have all animals in one place and it has a lot of animal photos & detailed info already which I suspect will expand.

And for the birders, I suspect that Merlin & eBird will stay on top for birds, but I’ve had lots of ID needs on other animals here and that is where I expect it to help me the most. We will see.

It was developed by a naturalist from Austria (like one of my favorite lodges was, Esquinas Rainforest Lodge, Golfito), so I have high hopes for it! 🙂 You also can use it to keep a record of the species you have seen by just clicking the eye icon when on a species page. I suspect it will continue to be expanded or updated and for now updates are free.

Go to your preferred App Store to find it available at two price levels (all animals or just one order of species like if only interested in insects):

Google Play

Apple App Store

Here’s just one of many pages as all wildlife orders are included . . .

Those who find beauty in all of nature will find themselves at one with the secrets of life itself. —L. Wolfe Gilbert

¡Pura Vida!

And my animals photo galleries are two: BIRDS and then OTHER WILDLIFE.