Costa Rica is a pretty mountainous place. When I glance out the window of our second story home, I can see the Cordillera Central off to my left, the hulking Irazu Volcano in front, and the ranges of the Talamancan and Escazu Mountains off to my right. Having grown up in non-mountainous Niagara Falls, New [...]
Continue reading about Some Common Highland Species to Know When Birding Costa Rica
The trails at Quebrada Gonzalez march through beautiful primary rainforests. It’s quality habitat for sure but that doesn’t make it easy to see birds. In fact, the sky high canopy and dense riot of foliage make the birding pretty darn challenging. Nevertheless, if it weren’t for the quality of the forest, Quebrada Gonzalez wouldn’t offer [...]
Continue reading about Good Mixed Flocks during Recent Birding at Quebrada Gonzalez
Two weekends ago, I finally got the chance to experience El Toucanet Lodge near Copey de Dota, Costa Rica. This highland birding site has popped up on the Costa Rican birding grapevine on a number of occasions so I was enthused about birding there while guiding the local Birding Club of Costa Rica. I have [...]
Continue reading about Birding El Toucanet Lodge, Costa Rica
I would love to guide three week tours in Costa Rica that culminate in 500 plus bird species. We would stalk mossy, middle elevation forests in search of Ochre-breasted Antpitta, quail-doves, and Lanceolated Monklet. Mid-morning skies above Quebrada Gonzalez would be scanned for hawk-eagles, King Vulture, and other raptors. Exciting, bird filled days would be [...]
Continue reading about Costa Rica Birding Highlights from Guiding at Carara National Park
I haven’t been birding in the western end of the Central Valley for at least a month but I was reminded of how good the birding is near the town of San Ramon when the Union de Ornitologos de Costa Rica released the Christmas Count Results for this area on March 4th. The results can [...]
Continue reading about Don’t Ignore the San Ramon Area When Birding Costa Rica
Cotingas! An appropriately evocative sounding name for breathtaking birds that look like the results of someone’s wild imagination. They all seem to be odd or wacky because birders familiar with temperate zone families just don’t know what to make of them. Purple-throated Fruitcrow- hmmm, if it’s a crow then why does it have shiny purple [...]
Continue reading about The Best Sites for Seeing Cotinga Species when Birding Costa Rica
Carara National Park is one of the better sites in Costa Rica for seeing ground birds of the forest interior. These are the terrestrial bird species that opt for shade over sun, that relish quiet, careful walks through the leafy texture of the forest floor, that haunt the dark understory with ventriloquial voices. You wont get warbler neck [...]
Continue reading about Carara National Park is good for ground birds
Cost Rica abounds with rivers, streams, rivulets, brooks, ravines, and glens. Even aquatic ecologists bound by profession to maintain strict definitions for bodies of water that flow down gradients would find all of the above and more in Costa Rica. The mountainous terrain and giant bucketloads of rain combine forces to fill the country with [...]
A couple of weeks ago, I was fortunate to finally get the chance to bird Laguna del Lagarto during three days of guiding. I emphasize “finally” because I had wondered how the birding was up there near the Nicaraguan border ever since my first trip to Costa Rica in the early 90s. It was so [...]
Continue reading about Exciting Birding in Northern Costa Rica at Laguna del Lagarto Lodge
In the latter months of 2010, we opted for traveling to Niagara Falls, NY for Thanksgiving in lieu of Christmas. We may have missed out on watching “A Christmas Story” with the family and couldn’t go to my Aunt Florence’s and Uncle Kevin’s on Christmas Eve but the fact that we also missed out on [...]
