Birding Adventures in Costa Rica

I needed an adventure. After a long hot Summer in Spain just seeing the same old birds I craved something new, so when my pilot son Tom put me back on his standby listing for cheap flights I said "How about Costa Rica next week?" Just two minutes on his phone and it was done. I would fly out next Wednesday to San Jose via Gatwick & come back when I felt like it. So that's what I did.

Howler Monkey at La Selva

I arrived in San Jose in the afternoon & checked into the mid priced Hotel Aeropuerto after getting a few car hire quotes from the big firms at their airport desks. At the hotel I asked the desk guy Phil if he knew anyone that could do better than those quotes and of course he did! So next day I picked up my Diahatsu Terios 4x4 from U-Save and set of for La Selva forest Biological Station over near the Caribbean coast.

Oh I forgot to mention that I picked up a few birds in the hotel gardens in San Jose, including Baltimore Oriole, Wison's, Tennessee and Yellow Warblers, plus Common Ground Dove and White Winged Pigeon.

Baltimore Oriole - icterus galbula

Wilson's Warbler - cardellina pusilla

Common Ground Dove - columbina passerina

White Winged Pigeon - zenaida asiatica

Yellow Warbler - setophaga petechia

La Selva

La Selva is primarily a research and educational institution but it accepts paying guests in reasonably comfortable cabins located with cafeteria type food on site, shared with the students and researchers. There is a free guided walk every morning at 6:30 and there are plenty of trails through the forest and along the river which can reveal some interesting birds and wildlife.

Chestnut Coloured Woodpecker - celeus castaneus

After finding my room which was on a separate site away from the main Centre, I went for a wander around the grounds and immediately started picking up some great birds. First was this beautiful Chestnut Coloured Woodpecker, closely followed by a stunning Blue Dacnis, one of several feeding on berries in the gardens.

Blue Dacnis - dacnis cayana

...strongly dimorphic, males and females are very different in colour.

Blue Dacnis female - dacnis cayana

More Tennessee Warblers, and some nice little Chestnut-sided Warblers were flitting around the bushes close to my cabin.

Tennessee Warbler - oreothlypis peregrina

Chestnut Sided Warbler - setophaga pensylvanica

As I set off to walk the forest trail through to the headquarters and dining hall I spotted my first Trogon of the trip. This one a superb Gartered Trogon sitting on a branch overganging the path. I love Trogons, they are such spectacular birds.

When I reached the main Centre I had a good lunch and purchased a copy of "The Birds of Costa Rica", the essential Field Guide by Richard Garrigues, illustrated by Robert Dean. This is one of the best field guides I have come across and it enabled me to identify almost all the birds that I photographed and many of the others that I spotted. Then I wandered around the extensive gardens picking up more small species such as the Scaly Breasted Hummingbird......

...the very common Social Flycatcher....

.. numerous Green Honeycreepers, here a male...

Green Honeycreeper male - chlorophanes spiza

...and now a female, feasting on berries.

..I was pleased to notice some Thick Billed Seed Finches on the grass.  At first glance I thought thet were just common Variable Seedeaters. Closer examination however and using the field Guide showed up the differences which was fortunate for me as it was a new species for my life list.

Thick Billed Seed Finch - oryzoborus funereus

Up before dawn next morning and around the lights in the car parking area I could see Nightjars wheeling around chasing moths and anything else attracted by the light. One sat on a kerb right next to my car, I was to learn that there were many varieties but I was only able to identify this one as a Common Pauraque, and one other which was quite distinctive with no white wing bars and a very bat-like flight pattern, a Short-tailed Nighthawk. Unfortunately I was not able to get any usable photos, they were too fast in very low light. But it was good to see so many of them. 

Panama Flycatcher - myiarchus panamensis

At 0630 I duly reported to the Reception Office ready for the guided walk. Our guide was extremely knowledgable and he showed us a lot of forest wildlife including three monkey species (Howler, Spider and Squirrel), other mammals including Aguti, Peccary and Three-toed Sloth. various Iguanas and lizards, Snakes, tiny Tree frogs and a very large Tarantula that he coaxed out from its hole under a leaf. Butterflies were everywhere including the amazing Blue Morpho and the huge Owl butterfly.

Howlers on the hanging bridge at La Selva

Collared Peccary

Three-toed Sloths

Blue Jeans frog

But this is a birding blog and I only had my heavy 500 mm lens with me, not ideal for photographing mammals, or insects at close range, so I will concentrate on the birds, of which there were some good ones. For example this wonderful Fasciated Antshrike. There is nothing I like better than capturing elusive, hard to find forest species that most people will never see let alone photograph. I should explain that rain was falling quite steadily most of the time here and it was extremely dark in the primary forest undergrowth. Use of flash was therefore essential and actually finding the bird, getting onto it with the camera and taking a decent shot, in focus and well exposed, is no mean feat and is therefore very rewarding. A lot harder than say, blasting a beaten grouse out of the sky which some people inexplicably seem to enjoy. 

Fasciated Antshrike - cymbilaimus lineatus

After the Antshrike we saw another Trogon, this time a female Slaty-Tailed Trogon, which was a new one for me. Fortunately they tend to sit in quite open spaces and this time flash was't necessary even though the light was not great. 

Slaty-Tailed Trogon - trogon massena

It was not long before we sighted the first Toucan of the trip, a superb Black Mandibled Toucan, one of several moving through some palms near the river. This yellow throated toucan looks identical to the Chestnut Mandibled Toucan that I had seen in Ecuador, but it differs slightly in DNA and their ranges do not overlap, so I claim it as another lifer.

Black Mandibled Toucan - ramphastos ambiguus

Next I was delighted to see a really stunning bird, the Rufous Motmot. It's a large Motmot nearly half a metre in length with a long bright blue tail sporting a bare shafted racket-shaped tip. For such a large, brightly coloured bird it is not easy to see because it inhabits dense forest, so I was well pleased with this one.

Rufous Motmot - baryphthengus martii

Back in some denser forest again and I managed to capture a flash photo of this Bright-rumped Attila, a member of the Tyrant Flycatcher family, about 18 cms long. Not a rare bird but another lifer for me.

Bright-rumped Attila - attila spadiceus

The Pied Puffbird below is a species I had very good sightings of in Ecuador, but it was nice to add it to the trip list here in Costa Rica as well.

Pied Puffbird - notharchus tectus

After our guided walk and a hearty breakfast I continued to walk some of the trails around the Reserve and to observe the birds around and in the gardens. One of my favourite small birds is the highly exotic looking Shining Honeycreeper, what a great name! Although a member of the Tanager family unlike them it has an elongated and decurved bill which make it quite different in appearance. I also like the clearly demarcated blue, black and yellow colouring. 

Shining Honeycreeper - cyanerpes lucidus

It's a strongly dimorphic species and the female has very different colouration.

Shining Honeycreeper female - cyanerpes lucidus

Here's another Hummingbird, a White Necked Jacobin which I caught in flight on the flowerbeds. The wing movement is too rapid to freeze without high speed flash equipment which I do not carry on overseas trips, but it was good to get a clear flight shot of this tiny bird.

After lunch I came across a group of Collared Aracaris, a very colourful and dramatic member of the Toucan family. They were busy feeding on some berries quite close to the dining hall so were easy to photograph. I had seen plenty of them before in Ecuador but this was too good a photo opportunity to miss.

Collared Aracari - pteroglossus torquatus

Collared Aracari - pteroglossus torquatus

It had been a very productive day with lots of great birds and some exciting wildlife, but during the afternoon the intensity of the rain began to increase so I retired to my chalet for a siesta. I planned a riverboat trip in the morning and was feeling quite tired after all my travelling, so I took it easy for a while.

Pesky Flies!

Next morning (Nov 20th) it was still raining. At breakfast I was told the river was too swollen for a boat trip and that anyway a Hurricane was on its way! What? Hurricane Otto was the first tropical cyclone since 1996 to survive crossing over from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean and it was also the southernmost hurricane on record to hit Central America. Forming late on November 21 in the southwestern Caribbean it travelled along the Nicaragua/Costa Rica border, claiming 23 lives, 10 of which were in Costa Rica. Just my luck to be here at the wrong time. It was very fortunate though that I had not booked anywhere in advance as I would have lost my money. I was planning on going next to Tortuguero on the Caribbean Coast, accessible only by boat, but that was out of the question now as it was cut off.

So I took a last walk down to a spot by the river where a Sun Bittern had been reported yesterday, but to no avail. Sadly I missed out on this, one of my target birds. Foiled by the weather. I did spot some nice Green Ibis in the treetops though which was some compensation as they were lifers.

I also got a poor shot of a Buff Rumped Warbler, another new one. By this time the rain was coming down heavily so I packed up quickly and left La Selva, heading for the Pacific Coast and hopefully some drier weather. La Selva had been good but now it was time to go.