Category: People

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Oxcart Parade Today . . .

. . . my first to see in 5 years now and hopefully I will be able to handle the heat and sunshine if it’s as hot as yesterday! I’m planning to find a place to sit on the steps of La Tribunal near the point where the parade first enters the Central Park area, so I can leave as soon as over or earlier if it is too hot. Wearing my wide-brim hat, taking an umbrella and yes, smearing myself with that awful sunscreen, 50 SPF! My oncologist requires it! 🙂

Annual Oxcart Parade, Atenas, Costa Rica

It may be another day or two before I get to posting photos of this Oxcart Parade, but below are links to the three previous parades I photographed before Covid. I missed 2015 & 2019 and then it was canceled for 2020 through 2022 during the Covid Pandemic and last year they moved it from April to August and I did not get the word, so glad to try and see it this year. I’m posting my usual nature blog posts a few days ahead, so there will still be one of those today and again on whatever day I post today’s photos! 🙂 And for now, here’s 4 more photos from the past . . .

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Tropical Greenstreak

The Tropical Greenstreak, Cyanophrys herodotus (linked to my gallery) is another tiny, fingernail-sized little butterfly that not many people even see. Here’s one shot from my garden recently.

Tropical Greenstreak, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica

¡Pura Vida!

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Red-spotted Scrub-Hairstreak

Not new for me, but semi-rare and found only in Central America & Mexico. Red-spotted Scrub-Hairstreak, Strymon ziba (linked to my gallery) is another one of those very tiny, fingernail-sized butterflies and this one I’ve seen only in my garden. You can see a few other photos from other countries on the butterfliesandmoths.org page.

Red-spotted Scrub-Hairstreak, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica

¡Pura Vida!

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Esmeralda Longtail

You might ask why the Common Name for this butterfly is in Spanish? “Esmeralda” = “Emerald” in English. Yes, it is unusual, even for species found only in Spanish-speaking Central America like this butterfly. It is of course named for the emerald-colored (green or turquoise) body of this Longtail Skipper which otherwise looks a lot like other Longtails! But not to be confused with a separate Turquoise Longtail! 🙂 And of course the scientific name is in Latin (esmeraldus) like every other species in the world. Esmeralda Longtail, Urbanus esmeraldus (linked to my Esmeralda Gallery) or you can see other people’s submitted photos on butterfliesandmoths.org, Esmeralda page. Just one shot here.

Esmeralda Longtail, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica

¡Pura Vida!

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Apricot Sulphur

And how can a butterfly named “Apricot” not be cool? 🙂 This Apricot Sulphur, Phoebis argante (my gallery link) I saw just a week ago in my garden for my fourth sighting! One other time in my garden and once each at Xandari and Banana Azul, my two best butterfly hotels here! Check out the different looks in my gallery linked above or study them online. Here’s two shots with more from that sighting in the above gallery.

Apricot Sulphur, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica
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The Bird and The Bee — Blue-vented Hummingbird

A rare hummingbird for my garden (seen there only one other time), the Blue-vented Hummingbird (eBird link) the other day facing off with a bee. 🙂 The hummingbird left. 🙂 This bird lives only in Costa Rica & Nicaragua.

Blue-vented Hummingbird, Atenas, Costa Rica
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Atenas “Oxcart Parade” & Related Activities 2024

I’m posting this because many local people don’t seem to know about it or when what is happening. In short, what expats call the “Oxcart Parade” is at 11 am on Sunday 11 August. You can figure out the rest. 🙂

¡Pura Vida!

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50+ Dragonflies Identified . . .

. . . with either the species or family genus name, most by species. That is because I decided to upload all my dragonfly and damselfly photos to Naturalista Costa Rica, the iNaturalist branch here, and of course you know that all members of iNaturalist can submit an identification of a species photo submitted. And lucky for me, one of the two authors of Dragonflies and Damselflies of Costa Rica is active on iNaturalist and so my many photos have been labeled by possibly the foremost specialist on Costa Rica Dragon and Damselflies. 🙂 You can see them in my gallery named: DRAGONFLIES & DAMSELFLIES (50+) which is now the first set of galleries under OTHER WILDLIFE. It was a lot of work, but now my photos are properly identified and are all on iNaturalist for posterity! 🙂 Plus, this gallery is now a good scientific database for research. And in the future I hope to do this with some other categories of my nature photos. 🙂 Though I will continue to post my birds on eBird and my butterflies on butterfliesandmoths.org

CLICK on the above image to go to the gallery. One of the largest Costa Rica Dragonfly Collections on the internet! 🙂

¡Pura Vida!

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3 Common Yellows this Week

In addition to a lot of Whites this week, I continue to see a lot of Yellows in my garden with the following three the most common . . .

The simplest is this Pale Yellow, Pyrisitia venusta, Atenas, Costa Rica.

For more photos, see my Pale Yellow Gallery.

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