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This morning’s rain not only interfered with a beautiful sunrise but also dampened my birding expedition with a great guide this morning. I try not to give up too quickly on such efforts, but did cut our hike a little shorter after my camera fogged up on the inside. All 12 of the following birds were photographed in the rain even if not obvious! 🙂 And we saw more birds and other animals, even in the rain! 🙂 Just imagine what it would have been like with a clear morning!
Today is a rainy day but I went ahead and visited the Sloth Sanctuary in Cahuita, Costa Rica and really glad I did! We had light rain the first part of the canoe trip and thus I did not take out my big camera until near the end, missing a lot of birds, but I have all of them from other places and enjoyed someone else paddling the canoe! 🙂
The canoe trip is to see where the sloths live in the wild before we go into the building to see the rescued sloths. We saw howler monkeys & lots of birds but no wild sloths. A VERY EXCELLENT TOUR that I highly recommend to anyone in this area! I sure learned a lot about sloths!
Banana Azul provided transportation to the sanctuary, about 15 minutes away. It is just as good as the Jaguar Rescue Center in Puerto Viejo and the Ara Project Manzanillo I had already visited here in the South Caribbean. I highly recommend all three! They all do great work saving animals and our environment! Part of the culture of Costa Rica! 🙂
🙂
¡Pura Vida!
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| Chestnut-headed Oropendola The other day I mistakenly called it a “Crested Oropendola,” which does not appear in this part of Costa Rica, only a few near Panama border in SW I’ve not seen this in Atenas, only the Montezuma Oropendola, a favorite! This one photographed at Rancho Naturalista, Tuis, Costa Rica |
The following photos were made at CATIE campus near Turrialba, an agronomic program for research and education for all of Latin America farmers, headquartered in Costa Rica with a campus Trip Advisor reviews if planning to go. Cost is now $10 per visitor. It helped to have a good birding guide because he sees things I often miss! There were a lot of small forest birds I could not photograph because of light, distance and small size of birds. But some of the ones I got below are “first-timers” for me and that is good as my bird collection grows.
here and one in San Jose. My guide at Rancho Naturalista, Harry, took 3 of us here for the morning of the 7th of Dec. It is a good birding place with a big pond or small lake and a Botanical Gardens with tropical plants from all over Latin America. This terrain is different than the lodge and has lots of possibilities. See the
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| Tropical Kingbird Too big for gray-capped or boat-bill flycatchers I believe. All three are colored the same and sometimes difficult to ID. CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
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| Northern Jacana, second in number only to egrets at the pond. CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
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| White-ringed Flycatcher, my first photo Like the Social Flycatcher except white on head makes a circle (ring) CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
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| Prothonotary Warbler, my first photo. CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
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| Keel-billed Toucan, always from a distance, Not easy for me to photograph. CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
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| Chestnut-sided Warbler, which I photographed again at lodge better This trip is my first time to photo this bird and twice at that! 🙂 CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
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| Chestnut-backed Antbird, not great photo but my first! CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
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| Common Tody-flycatcher, another 1st photo – A good day! 🙂 CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
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| Muscovy Duck, who we later observed mating 🙂 CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
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| Great-tailed Grackle, female, common all over Costa Rica CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
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| Baby Great Egrets, as this pond is a rookery for the Great Egret Though fluffy & black-billed like Snowy Egret, they are not! Note Mom’s black foot to left of baby head. Snowy’s have yellow feet. CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
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| Hoffman’s Woodpecker CATIE Campus, Turrialba, Costa Rica |
I value my garden more for being full of blackbirds than of cherries, and very frankly give them fruit for their songs. ~Joseph Addison, The Spectator, 1712