I joined 4 excellent young Tico birders to participate in the Cartago Christmas Bird Count and discovered a huge swathe of prime birding habitat close to Turrialba that seems to be little visited. Despite missing several very common species, our group of 5 amassed a total of 136 different species on our jaunt from Taus, near Pejibaye, past El Copal and to the downslope into Tapantí. We’d have done even better but had to be picked up by car late afternoon, still several kilometers short of our destination.
I say “jaunt”. What should have been 10 kilometers seemed at least twice as far, because we walked from 4:00 am until 4:00 pm, admittedly very slowly of course. It began after an uncomfortable night on the hard floor of the abandoned school in Taus just outside El Humo, which in turn is close by Pejibaye. We walked the first two or three kilometers, mostly uphill, in the dark, recording our first bird, a calling Great Potoo, at daybreak when we reached the start of the count circle.
My day’s list is much shorter than what our group recorded because it shows only the species that I personally managed to see/hear. You can see from the species diversity that we covered both middle and fairly high elevations.
First, here’s a pic, courtesy of Andrey Acosta, of one of the species highlights:
Gray-headed Kite near El Copal. Note the exuberant vegetation.
And now my day’s list:
- Little Tinamou
- Gray-headed Chachalaca
- Crested Guan
- Great Egret
- Green Ibis
- Black Vulture
- Turkey Vulture
- Gray-headed Kite
- Bi-colored Hawk
- Roadside Hawk
- Broad-winged Hawk
- Squirrel Cuckoo
- Common Pauraque
- Great Potoo
- White-collared Swift
- Stripe-throated Hermit
- Green-fronted Lancebill
- Fiery-throated Hummingbird
- Purple-throated Mountain-Gem
- Crowned Woodnymph
- Black-bellied Hummingbird
- Snowcap
- Rufous-tailed Hummingbird
- Gartered Trogon
- Collared Trogon
- Rufous Motmot
- Rufous-tailed Jacamar
- Prong-billed Barbet
- Collared Araçari
- Keel-billed Toucan
- Hairy Woodpecker
- Lineated Woodpecker
- Barred Forest-Falcon (voice)
- Barred Parakeet
- White-crowned Parrot
- Crimson-fronted Parakeet
- Chestnut-backed Antbird
- Zeledon’s Antbird
- Olivaceous Woodcreeper
- Wedge-billed Woodcreeper
- Plain Xenops
- Slaty Spinetail
- Yellow-bellied Elaenia
- Slaty-capped Flycatcher
- Common Tody-Flycatcher
- Yellow-margined Flycatcher
- Tropical Pewee
- Black Phoebe
- Dusky-capped Flycatcher
- Boat-billed Flycatcher
- Social Flycatcher
- Gray-capped Flycatcher
- Tropical Kingbird
- White-ruffed Manakin
- Cinnamon Becard
- Yellow-throated Vireo
- Philadelphia Vireo
- Brown Jay
- Blue-and-white Swallow
- Northern Rough-Winged Swallow
- Southern Rough-Winged Swallow
- House Wren
- Band-backed Wren
- Black-throated Wren
- Stripe-breasted Wren
- White-breasted Wood-Wren
- Gray-breasted Wood-Wren
- Long-billed Gnatwren
- Tropical Gnatcatcher
- Golden-winged Warbler
- Black-and-white Warbler
- Tennessee Warbler
- Olive-crowned Yellowthroat
- Tropical Parula
- Blackburnian Warbler
- Chestnut-capped Warbler
- Rufous-capped Warbler
- Golden-crowned Warbler
- Wilson’s Warbler
- Crimson-collared Tanager
- Passerini’s Tanager
- Blue-gray Tanager
- Palm Tanager
- Golden-hooded Tanager
- Speckled Tanager
- Spangle-cheeked Tanager
- Bay-headed Tanager
- Emerald Tanager
- Silver-throated Tanager
- Green Honeycreeper
- Black-and-yellow Tanager
- Slaty Flowerpiercer
- Bananaquit
- Yellow-faced Grassquit
- Buff-throated Saltator
- Black-headed Saltator
- Common Chlorospingus
- Black-striped Sparrow
- Rufous-collared Sparrow
- Hepatic Tanager
- Summer Tanager
- White-winged Tanager
- Red-throated Ant-Tanager
- Melodious Blackbird
- Black-cowled Oriole
- Baltimore Oriole
- Scarlet-rumped Cacique
- Montezuma Oropendola
- White-vented Euphonia
- Tawny-capped Euphonia
- Golden-browed Chlorophonia
We ended at Tapantí National Park, one of the prime birding destinations in Costa Rica, but our count area stopped before we actually reached the park. The trip was a very memorable one because my companions were not only a lot of fun to be with but also extremely knowledgeable. I hope to be able to bird with them again in the near future.
Gray-headed Kite (Leptodon cayanensis), Barred Parakeet (Bolborhynchus lincola) and White-winged Tanager (Piranga leucoptera) were life birds for me, but the views were either brief (parakeet) or distant (tanager) and so my favorite was the kite. This beautiful bird, with its mild-mannered facial expression, sat nicely for a good while at fairly close quarters near the entrance to El Copal lodge. Another true knee-trembler! A visit to El Copal is now on my short list of places I must visit.
We had repeated good views of Black-bellied Hummingbird (Eupherusa nigriventris) and Snowcap (Microchera albocoronata), two hummers that I rarely see:
Black-bellied Hummingbird, courtesy of Richard Garrigues
Male Snowcap at San Rafael de Santa Cruz, Turrialba, courtesy of Sue Magree
But the most interesting hummingbird was the Green-fronted Lancebill (Doryfera ludovicae) that perched repeatedly on a rock in the middle of a fast-flowing stream, darting out to take gnats in mid-air. Andrey Acosta actually waded into the stream to try to get close-up shots of this tiny bird with its long thin bill. Its plumage is quite dark, as befits a species often found in gloomy environments.
This Green-fronted Lancebill was hard to spot in the gloom of the river bottom.
Finally, though several families were well represented throughout the day, the array of tanager species, 11 in all, was particularly impressive. As already mentioned, the White-winged Tanager (no photo available) was a life bird for me, but I also see the Black-and-yellow and the Hepatic are also not frequently to be seen. Most of the common species were found, but the following photos (all by kind courtesy of Richard Garrigues) show three species that I find only with great difficulty here near my home:
Emerald Tanager with its distinctive ear-patch
Spangle-cheeked Tanager, a highland species
Speckled Tanager, well-named!
Birds for Beer 