Costa Rica: The Pacific Northwest

We had decided early on that we would plan our entire schedule on our own and only use guides when needed.  Chris had been to Costa Rica in the past and he had a good idea of places to visit. We had discussed the idea of renting a car, but decided against it as the public transportation is fairly cheap and very reliable.  The public transportation is a very economical way to get around.  However, one thing to keep in mind, is the fact that the public transportation is NOT geared for tall people with long legs.  Many times, I was uncomfortable as there was not enough leg room on buses and in some taxis.  Even on a short train ride that we took later in the trip, did not provide adequate leg room for a tall person.  That is just one thing to keep in mind if you are a tall person and if you are planning a trip on your own.  I even airlines now require me to pay more to get a seat with adequate leg room!

My trip began in the Pacific Northwest of Costa Rica.  We had found airfares into the Liberia Airport were considerably less than San Jose, so we opted to fly into Liberia.  This is a city of just over 50,000 people so we knew that getting around would be a bit easier with less traffic.  It is an area of Costa Rica that gets overlooked for birding an we felt we could add some much needed data to our eBird reports for this area.  We arrived in the rainy season for this area and it was hot, humid, and rainy.  We had decided early on that we would plan our entire schedule on our own and only use guides when needed.  Chris had been to Costa Rica in the past and he had a good idea of places to visit so we planned a trip based on a few spots where we spend about 3 nights and make day trips as needed.  We spent the first 3 nights in a casita just outside of Liberia, which met our needs, but I could have used a little bit bigger and more comfortable bed.  The point is that I survived.  We spent a lot of time exploring the rural area where we saw many great birds and even made a side trip to the beach town of Tamarindo for a day.  I picked up about 19 new life birds during this portion of the trip.  New mammals, reptiles, and butterflies were nice to see as well.  My blog posts will most likely include a lot more than just birds. Some of my bird photos were already posted in the previous post that referred to joining the 700/800 clubs.

The photos below are a sampling of the birds and other critters that we observed in Guanacaste Province which includes towns of Liberia and Tamarindo.

Groove-billed Ani - Very common in many places.

Elf butterfly

Black spiny-tailed Iguana

White Peacock butterfly

 Millipede

 Melodious Blackbird

White-collared Seedeater

 White butterfly

White-angled Sulphur

 Fiddler Crab

 Gulf Frittilary

 Ecuadorian hermit Crab

 Mantled Howler Monkey

 Malachite

 Letis scops Moth

 Tailless Whip Scorpion - totally harmless to humans

 Blue-black Grassquit

 Bare-throated Tiger-Heron

 Turquoise-browed Motmot - my 700th and one of my favorite birds.

Torpical Buckeye

More posts to come in different locations and totally different flora and fauna.  

Chiapas: La Sepultura, The Finale

As a reader, many of you are thinking I should be done with blog posts on this one day field trip!  Well, it was so special that if I tried to make it all one post, most would have gotten bored very quickly when reading it due to the shear length.  So this will be my third and final blog post on this remarkable day.

We left the pond and traveled just a short distance up the road where we stopped to try for another bird that had been located during scouting trips.  But along the way, I had the opportunity to view some Blue-black Grassquits.  This is a bird I had seen on the El Ocote trip, but since that day was probably my worst day of birding, this time I got to see them and enjoy them and actually get some photos of them.  They are definitely blue/black!!!

 Blue-black Grassquit

 Blue-black Grassquit

Blue-black Grassquit

Now back to the bird we were going to try finding, a Ferruginous Pygmy-Owl.  It was found before our gathering and was found on most of the other trips.  I think it was missed on one trip.  It took a while but it finally called from a distance and it eventually moved close to the road.  This is one of the rarest owls to find in Arizona, but they are fairly common in Chiapas.  A very limited range in Arizona, usually near the Organ Pipe National Monument and access to that area has been sketchy in the past.  I still want to try locating one in Arizona, but that will have to wait until my retirement becomes effective and when I have more time to devote to bird trips.  These owls are small at a little under 7" in length and can go undetected very easily.

 Ferruginous Pygmy-Owl

Ferruginous Pygmy-Owl

From there, we moved up the road a few miles and then traveled down a dirt road that was lined with small ponds of water and trees that were covered in heavy vegetation.  We had to be near some open water as the sky was filled with many water birds including Magnificent Frigatebirds.  This is an unmistakable bird in flight with its long forked tail and long, thin wings.  They are sometimes known as pirates of the sea as they will often harass other birds in flight hoping the other birds will disgorge anything they have eaten, then the frigatebirds will swoop down and catch the regurgitated spoils in flight.  

 Magnificent Frigatebird - Male

 Magnificent Frigatebird - Female

Magnificent Frigatebird - most likely a juvenile male

At one point we actually witnessed one harassing a Great Egret.  Don't think it had any luck in its quest to get a meal, but it was really a neat experience to watch.  Unfortunately, it was a bit too far for great photos, but I had to try and capture some of the action.

 Magnificent Frigatebird & Great Egret

Another life bird that I got to add to my list was the Wood Stork as one was flying over.  I really want to see this bird better than a fly-over and will probably have to make trip to the Gulf Coast to do so.  We also had a fly over Anhinga but it was a bit further away and I had trouble getting it into focus on my camera.

Wood Stork

Finally our day was drawing to an end and as we walked up the dirt road to our van, I heard a chip note in the roadside bushes that sounded a lot like the single chip note of the Verdin that is so common in Arizona, but I knew it was not.  Kind of an unexpected last minute new life bird for us was the Stripe-headed Sparrow.  A rather large sparrow with a large bill and quite attractive at that.

Stripe-headed Sparrow

With this last planned trip, our tours had come to an end, but Chris and I had extended our stay for 2 additional days while most of the crowd headed home.  And I am very glad we did (it was Chris's idea in the first place) as we got more photos and a few more birds on our own.  I have a couple more blog posts planned and they will have some more cool birds included.