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I haven’t found a species match yet, but sure that it is in this super family: Stink Bugs, Shield Bugs, and Allies Superfamily Pentatomoidea (linked to an iNaturalist page on this family).
¡Pura Vida!
And for more bugs, my gallery: More Costa Rica Insects which is separate from my Butterfly & dragonfly galleries. 🙂
Hiding in a piece of vegetation in the Los Angeles Cloud Forest Reserve two days ago. See more from several other locations in my gallery Masked Tree Frog, Similisca phaeota.
¡Pura Vida!
Here’s one shot each of a male & female Collared Trogon, Trogon collaris (my gallery link). They were the first two birds we saw in the Los Angeles Cloud Forest Reserve or Villa Blanca Cloud Forest Resort yesterday. Just waiting on us as we arrived! 🙂 This particular trogon is found only in Central America and the northern portions of South America. And as you can tell from my collection of photos (above linked gallery), is found only in the higher elevations like where we were yesterday, inside a cloud. 🙂
On all my past trips I’ve seen and photographed this Yellow-headed Caracara -Daptrius chimachima (my gallery link) but always in the past he was on a log, tree limb or the ground and once flying low near the ground. But this one of him flying high with that great wingspan showing is new for me. Not a good photo of a moving bird, 100 meter up, shot from a moving boat, but I at least I sort of captured that wide & colorful wingspan. Just one of many, many birds you can see on Rio Tarcoles! 🙂
And today is the day we leave early (5am) for a 6:30 birding hike at Villa Blanca Cloud Forest Hotel, north of San Ramon. Not as many birds but they will all be different than seen at Tarcoles and Carara Park and followed by a really good “Farm to Table” Breakfast and a visit to their gardens. I was there in 2017, my only time before today. On top of a mountain! This particular cloud forest reserve was the specific request of one of my Canadian birding friends. Walter is our transportation. And photos from there will be shared along with the Tuesday trip photos over the next few weeks. Every day is an adventure in Costa Rica! 🙂
¡Pura Vida!
One of the coolest things we saw at Carara National Park yesterday was a Perro Zompopo · Helmeted Iguana – Corytophanes cristatus also known as the Smooth Helmeted Iguana, Helmeted Basilisk, Helmeted Lizard and a few other common names. With that Perro Zompopo being the official Spanish common name on iNaturalist and of course that 3rd Latin name is the scientific name. He was in a lot of shade behind trees, limbs and vines in the thick transitional forest of Carara, thus difficult to photograph. The above shot with a greenish hue was on my Canon Camera while my cell phone shot through the spotting scope had a duller, brownish hue. 🙂 And my identification has not yet been approved by a specialist on iNaturalist, but I’m sort of confident of this.
We got scads of bird photos on Rio Tarcoles but it may take awhile to work through all of them, while the complicated online way of now entering national parks meant we didn’t get on trail to after 11 which is too late for birds, but our excellent guide, Andrys, found lots of other nature to experience and photograph. Both experiences were really good, though too much for one day for our age group. 🙂
¡Pura Vida!
This tiny little bee on the Spadix of an Anthurium (not a large pistil) was, I first thought, a Green Orchid Bee, but the AI of iNaturalist says no, it is one of many different species of sweat bees and once I post it on iNaturalist, it may or may not be given a species name, just the Tribe Augochlorini. He will go in my general Bees Gallery with only this tribal name for now. 🙂 He is less than half the size of yesterday’s orchid bee.
¡Pura Vida!
Early this morning Walter will take me and a group of 4 Canadian friends to breakfast at El Jardin on our way to a birding boat trip on Rio Tarcoles to its mouth on the coast followed by a birding hike in nearby Carara National Park, then lunch somewhere on our way back to Atenas. This is the second time I’ve arranged this always productive birding trip for this group.
Then on Thursday we go, at their request, to a mountain Cloud Forest Reserve north of San Ramon. There will not be as many birds there but all will be different from what was seen on the coast. Plus that 6:30am guided hike will be followed by a great “farm to table” breakfast at the Villa Blanca Cloud Forest Resort. I spent a couple of nights there during my earlier years in Costa Rica (2017) and it is nice, but I photographed only 9 species of birds that one time there. 🙂
¡Pura Vida!
The unusual “Cigar Plant,” Pampano or Gadetea in Spanish (Calathea lutea, scientific name) doesn’t attract many birds (an occasional hummingbird) but this large bee seems to like its nectar. The Belted Orchid Bee, Eulaema cingulata, is one of 8+ species in my Bees Gallery for Costa Rica. I may soon break that gallery up into species galleries. And with the mostly windy days now, bees are sometimes all I can find to photograph! But tomorrow I go birding with some visiting Canadian friends to Rio Tarcoles & Carara National Park, so that will boost my lagging daily photos! 🙂
That is what this Tropical Kingbird (my gallery link) was eating one morning last week. 🙂
¡Pura Vida!
¡Pura Vida!
The most often seen bird in my garden with a lot of photos in the gallery: Rufous-tailed Hummingbird. 🙂
¡Pura Vida!