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The Most Biodiverse Areas for Birds in Costa Rica

Planning a birding trip to Costa Rica? You might be wondering which are the most biodiverse areas for birds. It’s a fairly common question and a good one. After all, what birder wants to go to the least biodiverse areas for birds? That high avian diversity is one of the main reasons birders visit Costa Rica, some other reasons being “quetzal”, “Wrenthrush”, “umbrellabird”, and “Snowcap”.

In general, the more birds the better and, in that, Costa Rica fits the bill. No, we aren’t the most avian diverse nation on the planet but, we do have a heck of a lot of birds per square kilometer (or mile or league). With most also being quite accessible, it’s no wonder Costa Rica is a top destination for birding tourism. So, which areas have the most bird species? Which areas outperform for avian diversity?

In a sense, I could just say “the entire country”. From the Central Valley, Costa Rica is small enough for me to drive an hour or two in a few different directions and reach vastly different avifaunas. Seriously, as I write, there are over 700 bird species within a radius of 50 miles. It’s true! In a show of obsession for accuracy or curiosity or getting carried away with playing with Google Earth, I measured a 50 mile line stretching from my home in San Francisco de Heredia and made a circle.

I discovered that I am still amazed by the short distances created by a straight line in Costa Rica and, that my 50 mile birding radius encompasses everything from dry forest habitats to Monteverde, Carara, Caribbean lowlands, foothill forest as far as Turrialba, part of the General Valley, and the near continental shelf edge offshore from Quepos. In other words, I’m, smack in the middle of a heck of a lot of bird species. Within this Google Earth area, I counted 598 resident bird species and 160 migrants. Since I left out non-annual vagrants including the Aplomado Falcon currently hunting south of Jaco, there’s probably a few more.

Yes, definitely 700 plus bird species within 50 miles so how come I haven’t recorded that many this year? That stems from a fair percentage of those birds being rare or hard to detect, and me not having visited certain areas long enough this year to see them (such as the open ocean and a few other choice spots).

With all those birds in mind within such a short distance, we could say that the most biodiverse area for birds in Costa Rica is Costa Rica itself but, since we can’t travel “as the crow flies”, we’re better off talking about much smaller areas. These are the ones that come to mind.

The Carara Zone

streak-chested-antpitta

The Carara area is arguably the most avian diverse area in Costa Rica. It’s got a trick up its sleeve but, there’s no other site of similar area in Costa Rica (or Middle or Central America) that harbors as many bird species.

The crazy bird numbers don’t come from the national park although the mature, protected forests do play a vital role. They stem from Carara being a massive ecotone that blends dry forest with rainforest, mangroves, second growth, and wetlands. Yep, all those habitats all very close to each other. The end result is massive bird diversity (along with other stuff).

Monteverde

Male Three-wattled Bellbird.

This famous and heavily visited area is also a major hotspot. Sort of like Carara, all those birds living there are explained by sizeable areas of mature, protected cloud forest, some slightly lower elevation forest on the Caribbean slope, and dry forest habitats on the Pacific side.

In other words, Monteverde is also an ecotone of sorts, one with hundreds of bird species. In the past, when we did Christmas Counts there, I think we routinely turned up more than 400 species.

Poas Route 126

While the high elevations on Poas Volcano don’t host as many species as other areas in Costa Rica, when we also consider a surrounding area that includes dry/moist habitat birds in the Central Valley and middle elevation and foothill habitats on the adjacent Caribbean slope, we’re talking a lot of bird species.

This general area also having some of the most accessible birding to the Central Valley also earns points.

Bijagua

The Bijagua/Volcano Tenorio area also racks up the bird species. Like Monteverde and Carara, it likewise acts as an ecotone where dry habitats meet mature, wet foothill rainforest. Throw in some small wetlands and a trail or two that reaches cloud forest and we have a huge number of bird species. There might be around 400 possible.

Sites with Foothill and Lowland Forest

The other main sites in Costa Rica with major bird diversity are any place that combines foothill rainforest with lowland rainforest and/or cloud forest. Foothill and lowland forest on their own are always high diversity. Combine the two and you’ll have more than enough birds to look for even during a week of birding.

Emerald Tanager

Sites that come to mind are Rancho Naturalista, Hotel Quelitales, Reserva Las Brisas, parts of the Osa, Esquipulas, the remote Pitilla Biological Station, the Arenal area, and the San Vito area.

Wait, but what about Las Selva or Tortuguero or the Osa and the La Gamba area? Yes, those areas have lots of birds too, are fantastic, and you’d be birding wise to visit them. However, when talking about similar-sized areas that have ecotones, those sites seem to have more species. No matter what, as long as you bird in good habitat when birding Costa Rica, you can’t go wrong!

To learn more about birding at the sites mentioned above and many others, support this blog by purchasing my 900 plus page ebook “How to See, Find, and Identify Birds in Costa Rica”. I hope to watch birds with you here in Costa Rica!

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A Good Time for Birding the Southern Caribbean in Costa Rica

October isn’t the most popular month for visiting Costa Rica but, as far as us local birders are concerned, pumpkin season is the best month for birding. Yes, we are deep in the heart of the wet season and yes, it rains a heck of a lot (especially this year) but, you know where the sun still shines?

Try the southern Caribbean zone. That would be the area from Limon southeast to Sixaola. I’m talking places like Cahuita, Puerto Viejo de Talamanca, and Manzanillo-Gandoca (and Tortuguero ain’t that shabby either!). It only takes a quick eBird check to see that several local birders have been in that area as of late, with luck, we’ll pay a visit soon too.

I want to go to catch the tail end of migration, to see the final movements of swallows and Peregrines and raptor movements. With that hurricane churning in the northern Caribbean basin, I’m also hoping it might send a weird bird or two our way, both on sea and on land.

I’ve also noticed a few more international tours to that area happening in October. I think more agencies have realized just how good it can be, how exciting the birding is when you mix a major migration corridor with a plethora of resident rainforest birds.

Here’s some specifics why, the things that keep me coming back and wishing I had a migration vacation house down that way:

Migration is fantastic

I didn’t mention major migration corridor for kicks. The Caribbean coast of Costa Rica really is migration central, especially in the southern part where a low coastal mountain approaches the sea. As happens in such geographic situations, birds tend to get funneled between the hills and the water. Stand in that funnel and you’re likely to witness an aerial avian stream, sometimes for hours.

The Hirundines, Chimney Swifts, and Eastern Kingbirds move through in the thousands, occasional birds getting caught by fair numbers of Merlins and Peregrines. Keep watching and you might catch a Black Swift or two in the bunch, maybe some Common Nighthawks flying way up there too.

Check any and all vegetation and you’ll see the less aerial birds on their way to South America. There’s Scarlet Tanagers, Bay-breasted Warblers, wood-pewees, Dickcissels, and other birds moving through.

Chances at something rare, maybe something new

As with any migration hotspot, a birder also always has a chance at the rare ones, the needles in the foliage haystack. Some, like rare swallows, could easily pass overhead unnoticed among the thousands of similar species (I bet it happens with one or more Sinaloa Martins). Others are waiting to be found in an abundance of rainforest vegetation, naturally hiding way up there in the canopy or in too many areas to check.

How many Connecticut Warblers skulk through? Even if a dozen were in the area, they’d still get missed. What about Swainson’s Warbler? Yeah, that’s a stretch but despite it not being on the official list, one was seen in 2017. There’s gotta be a few more quietly absconding in wet swampy woods that no one birds.

Out on the ocean, other intriguing birds pass by, get the right conditions and pelagics do occasionally show. There’s just not enough people officially watching for long enough to document them.

Then there’s the truly new birds for Costa Rica, the ones likely to be documented at some point. These are birds like Carib Grackle, Cocoi Heron, White-tailed Trogon, and maybe Rufous-breasted Hermit, Blue Cotinga, and Pacific Antwren. All live pretty close, all are possible, and are why I include them on the Costa Rica Birds app as “not seen” birds.

Top notch resident rainforest species

If you don’t find a new bird for Costa Rica, you’ll still see lots of the regular ones. One of the great things about birding this region is the degree of accessible mature forest habitat, even around many hotels.

Birds like toucans, parrots, puffbirds, Great Potoo, Black-crowned Antshrike, and Purple-throated Fruitcrows are all fairly common. There’s also plenty of woodcreepers, flycatchers, and other expected lowland species, even chances at Agami Heron, kingfishers, and other waterbirds along forested creeks.

Raptors can be good too and include Common Black-Hawk, hawk-eagles, Bat Falcon, Gray-headed Kite, and other species. Although it would be lottery rare, who knows if a Harpy or Crested Eagle might also wander in from populations in Panama or the lower slopes of the Talamancas? That would be very lucky but forest connections indicate that it is possible.

Other rare or uncommon birds to look for include Black-crowned Antpitta, Snowy Cotinga, Slaty-backed Forest-Falcon, Ocellated Antbird, and Sulphur-rumped Tanagers among others.

Underbirded

The area gets a lot of visitors but, it’s not exactly on the main birding tour route. That leaves much of the southern Caribbean underbirded even with several local guides and birders living there. There’s just not enough birders to adequately cover the amount of habitat.

That underbirded label means that there’s more places to explore and that you shouldn’t be too surprised to find some birds absent from eBird hotspots. As always, birds are where the habitat is and there’s a lot of it south of Limon. To learn more about where to go birding in this area, check out my Costa Rica birdfinding ebook.

Great food, lots of accommodation options, and some nice beaches too

Having come into its own as a tourist destination some years ago, this part of Costa Rica also boasts a number of choices for accommodation. Many are small hotels and house rentals but you’ll also find some cheaper and larger more expensive options too.

There’s lots of good restaurants too, some pricey, others more affordable but at least you have lots to choose from. Oh and there’s some nice beaches too although I tend to do more seawatching from them than venturing into the water. Just a note that if you do enter the water, not all beaches are good places to swim and you have to be be extremely careful of rip tides (tragically, one took the life of Malcom-Jamal Warner earlier this year).

If you are in Costa Rica these days, you might want to consider making your way to the southern Caribbean coast. I’m hoping I do, there’s a lot of birds waiting for me down that way.

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Raptor Festival at the Refugio Lapa Verde, Costa Rica

Raptor Festival! Who doesn’t love the sound of a festive gathering that celebrates raptorial birds? Such venue are destined to be cool. And it was. We nearly missed the gig but thanks to a casual Facebook check Friday evening, I noticed a quick, short video that mentioned the second annual raptor festival taking place at Refugio Lapa Verde, October 18th.

That sounded fun and it was free but yikes! We were talking the following day and although the LapaVerde Refuge is straight line close, sans flying car, getting there would mean 2 hours driving up and over the Central Cordillera mountain range (a common situation in Costa Rica). That actually isn’t so bad, especially if you like watching birds; the route passes through a few different life zones that hide 100s of bird species.

It’s the getting back part that can be tiresome (and whoah nelly, read on to hear about that challenge) as well as the leaving early enough part to get there in time (if you like to sleep in). However, on Saturday morning, we shrugged off any worries about those potentially challenging parts of the trip and made our way to the festival. Here’s how that day went along with recommendations and other hopefully helpful tidbits.

The height of fall migration in Costa Rica

This is it, third week of October in Costa Rica, the major final push of birds headed here and onward to the rich wintering forests of South America. See them while you can, see if you’ll get lucky with a quick cuckoo sighting or ironic, non-red Scarlet Tanager flocks and kingbird movements.

There’s also the raptors, the thousands of TVs and Swainson’s Hawks and Broad-wings soaring overhead, many of which pass over the hawkwatch at the Refugio Lapa Verde. Those big winged flyers are the main reason for the raptor festival but there’s other birds too, hiding and foraging in the vegetation of the refuge.

Even before we left for our cross mountain drive, I went looking for those migrants. I did my usual brief walk in our neighborhood, one that passes near a rare adjacent farm and narrow riparian zone. The Traill’s Flycatcher sallying down to the cut grass, a few pewees, Dickcissel, my first Bay-breasted Warbler of the year and a few other birds were a reminder of peak migration happening. A quick message from another local birder who had heard tons of Swainson’s Thrushes passing over pre-dawn skies was another reminder as were the birds we saw later that day.

An important, multi-faceted refuge

The Lapa Verde Refuge is privately-owned protected land that encompasses some of the last sizeable remaining areas of Caribbean lowland rainforest in Costa Rica. Just across the road from the Selva Verde forests and northwest of La Selva, the habitat is also loosely connected to other patches of forest that eventually reach the Nicaraguan border.

These connections and location make the refuge an ideal area to help conserve the Great Green Macaw. We need more reforestation for better forest connections outside of the refuge but Ecovida (the organization that owns and manages the refuge) has certainly been doing an excellent job.

Since 2013, through active reforestation and just letting the forest grow back on its own, they have reforested more than 300 hectares. The remaining 1500 hectares protects older rainforest, swamps, and other wetlands. This wealth of habitats is of course ideal for maintaining the complex biodiversity native to northern Costa Rica including important second growth habitats used by warblers and other small migrant birds (the same type of habitat frequently eliminated for pineapple farms).

Great Green Macaws and more

Thanks to the forests in the refuge, Great Green Macaws are regular (we saw several during our visit), and most expected lowland species have been recorded. This includes Slaty-backed Forest-Falcon (rare), Tiny Hawk, Ornate Hawk-Eagle, Snowy Cotinga, puffbirds, motmots, and more.

Although Agami Heron, Rufescent Tiger-Heron and some other birds aren’t on the list, I’m sure they are at least occasionally present too, probably just in less accessible spots.

On our visit, we didn’t see too much but our birding was also limited to sunny mid-day weather and a short tour mostly meant to educate visitors about the refuge. Even so, we still encountered several expected warblers (as well as a beautiful male Prothonotary), other migrants, some migrating kettles, King Vulture, and some other birds.

Raptor celebration

In addition to free tours to learn about the refuge, festival attendants also enjoyed everything from DJ’d music to face painting, story telling, and an honest to goodness magic show. There was a lot going on and it sometimes got loud but I was impressed!

Local kids had also submitted artwork, there were vendors selling arts and crafts, a Vortex optics stand with binos and scopes to sample, snow cones, and other raptor festival foods.

Although we didn’t stay until the finale, the festival ended with a concert and fire juggling! We made up for missing that by watching the fun folks from dance around in identifiable raptor costumes. As was befitting their aggressive nature, the Ornate Hawk-Eagle and Black and white Hawk-Eagle also chased a couple of kite flying kids around.

The Ecovida hawkwatch tower

Part of our tour included a visit to the refuge’s crown jewell; the hawkwatch tower. Situated on a hill, it provided a fantastic view of the surrounding forests and skies. It somewhat reminded me of canopy towers in the Amazon, I’d love to be up there pre and post dawn. It would also be the perfect spot to do a big sit and raise funds for refuge projects.

Although we weren’t at the tower at an ideal time, the counters do see many thousands of raptors during the migration season along with lots of other cool birds.

Visiting the refuge

The raptor festival was an open house, fun, celebratory event but that’s not the norm. It seems like the refuge is mostly there for research and protecting habitat. Although their site does mention ecotourism and they do receive visits, there’s not a lot of information about entrance fees and so on.

If interested in visiting, it would be best to contact them to get the full deal. I’ll also be doing that and including that information in the next update for my Costa Rica bird finding book. I’ve already got a list of other places to update and include, it’s amazing how many new birding sites pop up for well-birded Costa Rica!

What I can say is that if you do visit, you should have a fair chance at a wide variety of lowland birds while watching from their trails and the tower.

The insane drive back

On another note, the drive back wasn’t as easy going as the drive there. Not quite. Driving up and over the mountains in dry weather and daylight is another world compared to doing that at night and in pouring rain.

The problem with night driving there and in much of Costa Rica is the lack of illumination coupled with a concurrent lack of painted roads with reflectors. That’s bad enough in the driest of weather but when you throw in slick roads and constant rain, you’re faced with a potentially life and death situation.

Seriously. It’s hard to see the edge of the road and if you venture off of it, you’re vehicle will likely be rolling down the mountain. Luckily, the rain was too bad on our drive up and, by taking it slow and easy, we made it to the to without too much anxiety. However, from there, as we descended towards Alajuela, the rain got heavier to the point of deluge level craziness with some road flooding (albeit shallow enough to drive through). Add in other drivers, some of whom insist on passing and it’s no wonder we ran into an accident. Not us thank goodness but it did close the road and made us take a detour to get back on track.

The moral of that story is to avoid driving at night in Costa Rica, especially in mountains and during the wet season. Fortunately, you don’t really have to and it’s much easier during the dry season. Happy birding, I hope to see you here!

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October Global Big Day 2025, Costa Rica

A Wrenthrush risks it all and comes out into the open.

This past weekend was special, especially for birders. Saturday, October 11th was Global Big Day! Yes, we had one in May too but that was Spring migration and, it was on a date that favors birding in the northern temperate zone. To make up for those spring birds that had already flown north and catch major fall migration in other, tropical locales like Costa Rica, eBird has also designated a Global Big Day for October!

Although we love May birding in Costa Rica, October is when we get truly excited about migration. Birds are coming back for the winter, thousands of other birds are passing through, and knowing that rare migrants are possible floats our birding boat. With those tantalizing thoughts in mind, us local birders are eager and pumped for October Global Big day. It might pour down rain but we still go birding, we still celebrate birds and we do it en masse.

It’s easy to want to go birding when you can look for birds like the Keel-billed Motmot.

This year, since I hadn’t heard much hype about October Big Day, I wondered if fewer people would participate. It took but a brief glance at the results to vanquish any worries. More than 950 birders in Costa Rica submitted lists that turned up a collective and impressive 722 species (including the undescribed Puntarenas Screech-Owl).

That’s a heck of a lot of birds, especially for an area the size of Wales or West Virginia. Here’s some of many highlights and observations:

Organized birding outings

It was nice to see that some hotels and groups had organized birding outings for October Global Big Day. I hope some of those outings brought more people into the birding fold, I suspect they did. I know they saw lots of cool birds and were celebrating October birds at the same time as folks in the Philippines, Tanzania, Colombia, and most other corners of the globe. That right there is one of the things I dig most about any Global Big Day; knowing that thousands of other people are celebrating and enjoying birds at the same time.

Uncommon migrants

We didn’t have too many rare migrants but we birders in Costa Rica did find a few. More than one person had the decidedly uncommon Black-billed Cuckoo, a few Yellow-billed Cuckoos, Tree Swallow (yeah, hard to believe but uncommon here!), Veery, Yellow-breasted Chat, and Blue-winged, Yellow-throated, and Townsend’s Warblers.

If migration hadn’t been backed up, we may have also had a few more uncommon migrants.

Some uncommon resident species found, some missed

Local birders found a good number of uncommon resident species including Bare-necked Umbrellabird, Turquoise Cotinga, Violaceous Quail-Dove, Black-banded Woodcreeper, Leaftossers, antpittas, Red-fronted Parrotlet, and Ochraceous Pewee.

Some of the uncommon and rare species “missed” included Silvery-throated Jay, Great Jacamar, Lanceolated Monklet, and Black-crowned Antpitta among a handful of other birds. No big surprise there, none of these species are easy or common in Costa Rica. Look for them the right way and in the right places and you can find them but they aren’t easy.

Guiding in the Poas area

Usually, I do Global Big Day in intense birding style but this year, I was scheduled to guide a couple of visiting birders. That worked out well because even if I hadn’t been scheduled to guide, I would have been doing some easy-going birding anyways. Having had surgery two and a half weeks before then, I wasn’t really ready for intense Big Day birding.

However, I was well enough to guide in the Poas and Varablanca area; a region with excellent, easy-going roadside birding. Cool and wet weather kept some birds quiet but we still managed seeing and hearing quetzals, Barred Parakeets, Fiery-throated and several other species of hummingbirds, Flame-throated Warbler, Wrenthrush, and other cool highland birds.

All 49 regular occurring hummingbirds

Speaking of hummingbirds, local birders found all regular occurring species including migrant Ruby-throated (nice to know they have arrived), Green-fronted Lancebill, White-tipped Sicklebill, coquettes, and various other species.

All rail species minus a coot

Local birders also did very well with the Rallidae, finding everything from Mangrove Rail to Paint-billed and Yellow-breasted Crakes. The only rail species missing was American Coot! Before you laugh, note that this chalk-billed, duckish bird is an uncommon wintering bird in Costa Rica. I guess they haven’t really arrived yet.

The fact that all the other rails were encountered shows how developed birding in Costa Rica has become. It wasn’t all that long ago that Mangrove Rail was unknown for the country and that Yellow-breasted and Paint-billed Crakes were birding dreams. Now, as long as you know where to find birds in Costa Rica and go with the right guide, you can see them fairly easily.

Most raptors and all 14 owls

Raptors are naturally uncommon in Costa Rica but, as October Global Big Day shows, if you get enough birders out there in enough places, birds get seen. All regular species were seen except for the three rare and challenging ones (Black and white Hawk-Eagle, Red-throated Caracara, and Slaty-backed Forest-Falcon), and the two major megas (Crested and Harpy Eagles). As for Gray-bellied Hawk and Solitary Eagle, the hawk is a very rare migrant and the eagle might not even occur. Maybe, but the fact that it hasn’t been documented, even on Global Big Days is telling. Even so, I still believe we need focused expeditions and searches in the right places to properly assess the status of the biggest black-hawk in Costa Rica.

As for the owls, we did very well, only missing the three main vagrant species (Burrowing, Great Horned, and Short-eared, all of which are crazy mega winter vagrants).

Local birders also saw lots of tanagers, trogons, puffbirds, parrots, antbirds, and that wealth of other tropical birds that helps make Costa Rica a major global birding hotspot. It did rain in many places but that didn’t stop us from finding well over 700 species! Imagine how much you could see with two weeks of birding in Costa Rica?

To get an idea of the types of uncommon birds you can see on a carefully designed itinerary, check out this Hillstar Nature Costa Rica birding tour I helped craft for late March and early April, 2026. They still have spaces available! If you are interested in seeing a Rosy Thrush-Tanager, Ocellated Crake, Black-bellied Hummingbird, Scaled Antpitta, Black-cheeked Ant-Tanager, and lots more, contact me today at information@birdingcraft.com .

I hope to see you here, the birds are waiting!

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Costa Rica Birding Expectations for the Final Quarter

birding Costa Rica

Fall is happening, the year’s final fourth. In Costa Rica, look around and you’ll find a scattering of pumpkin spice and occasional Halloween decor but no changing of leaves, cool nights, or cold weather precursors.

We do have hints of winter but they don’t come knocking with frosty fingers, chilled air, and tail-flashing juncos. Instead, we get the boreal summer birds; Baltimore Orioles, Yellow Warblers and waterthrushes dipping tails over puddles and mangrove roots. Go birding in Costa Rica these final quarter days and you’ll see our winter arrivals. You’ll also see the northern nesters sharing space with resident species like Blue-gray Tanagers, motmots, and other neotropical beauties.

A common beauty.

It’s not the high season but the birds are still here, more than enough to watch. Here’s some of what to expect in these latter months of 2025.

Urban birding

Try as you will to get into the real nitty gritty of Costa Rica birding, you’ll probably still find yourself doing some urban birding. I’m talking hotel gardens and patches of habitat in the people zone. It’s alright, there’s always more around than you think, always more to see and always good (especially at hotels like Villa San Ignacio, Robledal, the Bougainvillea, and others that host and cherish green space).

Don’t spend too much time away from the birdier forests but don’t not bird around your hotel either. As encouragement, here’s some of what I’ve been recently seeing and hearing in the tiny bits of habitat (especially a small neighboring farm) near home, in the middle of a city:

-Short-tailed and Gray Hawks are daily, yesterday morning, a kiskadee was dive bombing a perched, dark morph Short-tailed Hawk.

-White-fronted Parrots, and Orange-chinned and Crimson-fronted Parakeets do daily morning and evening flyovers, sometimes, critically endangered Yellow-naped Parrots too.

-Tropical Mockingbirds sipping from orange flowers, Rufous-tailed and Cinnamon Hummingbirds at flowering bushes, occasional Green-breasted Mango on a high perch.

-Brown Jays creeping and getting scolded by Rufous-backed Wren and various other small birds.

Rufous-backed Wren

-Speaking of small birds, there are common flycatchers like Tropical Kingbird, Great Kiskadee, Boat-billed Flycatcher, Social Flycatcher, and Common Tody-Flycatcher. Lately, I’ve also been seeing migrant pewees, Baltimore Orioles, and wintering Yellow Warblers among small numbers of migrating Red-eyed Vireos, Blackburnian, Black and white, and Chestnut-sided Warblers.

-Migrating swallows a la Barn, Bank, and Cliff. I also got lucky with a lone male Purple Martin. I keep looking up, hoping for a random shorebird or lost nighthawk, maybe win a birding lottery Cave or Violet-green Swallow.

-Tropical Screech-Owl calling from the farm next door. I don’t hear it every night and I wonder, is it just moving through or, does it live there all year long? With luck, it will roost from a viewable spot.

-Handsome Hoffmann’s Woodpeckers, our local version of the Red-bellied or Gila or other common woodpecker. Today, I also heard a Lineated laughing from the riparian zone.

-There’s more, always more to make hotel garden birding worthwhile.

No hurricanes but more than enough rain

In Costa Rica, we don’t usually get smashed by hurricanes but, we still get that rain. Lately, a heck of a lot of it. A hurricane happens somewhere in the Caribbean and droves of rain happen here. A tropical storm system takes place and we can get hammered with road smashing precipitation.

These days, it’s been a bit too much; buckets and waves of falling water that overflow creeks, race down roads, and precipitate landslides. Unfortunately, the main road from San Ramon to Puntarenas got washed out. I’m not sure when it will be fixed but surely before the high season. In the meantime, we’ll probably see even more traffic on the main road to the Pacific Coast, Route 27.

This link sums up roads affected and closed by heavy rains. There will surely be more, if driving from now until December, check Waze to see what’s open, think twice before driving in heavy rain on mountain roads, and don’t drive through flooded areas.

Altitudinal migrants

Heavy rains happen but the birds are still here. Several species also react to the weather. When birding lower elevations, keep an eye out for altitudinal migrants like White-ruffed Manakin, Olive-streaked Flycatcher, Black-faced Solitaire, and others.

Male White-ruffed Manakin.

Umbrellabirds have also arrived to lower elevations (rare and mostly in mature rainforest in the foothills and adjacent lowlands), rare Lovely Cotingas and bellbirds can show up at lower elevations along with some hummingbirds and other interesting birds.

Year List

On a personal note, despite getting sidetracked by necessary (and thankfully successful) surgery, my year list is coming along alright. I’m at 648 species in Costa Rica for 2025, some of which I’ve added from nocturnal flight calls in the backyard (the usual way I record Veery and Gray-cheeked Thrush). There’s still time to see more, hopefully, I’ll get to the right places soon.

I hope you get out birding soon too, especially in Costa Rica. A lot to see down here and, birds are more active before and after the rains.

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Spots Open for Fantastic Southern Pacific Costa Rica Birding Tour

Black-bellied Hummingbird

Costa Rica is a small place. We’e talking the size of West Virginia or Wales. You’d think a nation that small would be pretty easy to bird, fairly easy to “clean up” after one birding trip.

For many places, it’d be normal to reach that conclusion but, while Costa Rica is small, this birdy nation also has a trick up its sleeve,; several factors that keep you coming back for more. Either because they love the place or, realize they still have lots more to see, many birders do repeat trips to Costa Rica.

They might want to see a White-tipped Sicklebill.

Basically, you can’t see all the birds in one trip to small Costa Rica because this southern Central American nation is a geographical biodiversity generator. Like a mini continent, Costa Rica borders two oceans, and has mountains running down the nation’s spine that separate dry forests in the northwest from the Caribbean slope rainforests in the east. Different life zones in those same mountains host their own avian suites and, on the Pacific side, south of the Tarcoles River, dry forests suddenly become wet forests, rare rainforests with a high level of endemism.

Throw in localized habitats like mountaintop paramo, wetlands, mangroves, and intermontane valleys and the result is an incredible wealth of biodiversity, more than 600 resident species birds included. Add the migrants and Costa Rica currently boasts a bird list topping 930 species.

It’s why, even though birders can enjoy a fantastic ten day or even two week trip to Costa Rica, they can’t see everything. It’s also why I have helped Hillstar Nature design a trip to connect with the wealth of birds that reside in southern Costa Rica; species many birders have not seen on the more regular Costa Rica birding circuit.

This tour runs from March 29 to April 9 and is aimed at seeing specialties like Rosy Thrush-Tanager, cotingas, Black-bellied Hummingbird (like the feature image), White-crested Coquette, and even Ocellated Crake. Tough birds indeed and seeing them does require some luck but, even more so, it requires birding in the right places with the right local guides. We’ll be doing that and some to connect with as many southern Pacific specialties as possible.

Check out this itinerary:

Day 1. Arrivals, night at Villa San Ignacio in Alajuela

Arrival days aren’t usually the best days for birding. Often, the plane touches down after dark and you are more concerned with getting a good night’s rest than spotlighting for owls. But, sometimes you do arrive in time for birding and that’s where Villa San Ignacio comes into play.

This friendly little place is just 15 minutes from the airport, has beautiful gardens crowned with huge figs, other vegetation that attracts a healthy variety of birds, and excellent service. It’s why I often recommend it as a great starting and/or ending point for any trip to Costa Rica.


Day 2. Transfer to the spectacular birding lodge, Hotel Quelitales

After some fine introduction birding to Costa Rica at Villa San Ignacio, you’ll eventually make your way to one of Costa Rica’s newest and best birding lodges; Hotel Quelitales.

Owned by a local birder, it’s no wonder this special place has become a fantastic hotspot. The hummingbird garden can bring in uncommon species like Black-bellied Hummingbird, White-bellied Mountain-gem, Green-fronted Lancebill while other spots may turn up Scaled Antpitta or even Black-breasted Wood-Quail.

White-bellied Mountain-gem

Many. many other birds are also possible, right outside your door.


Day 3. Tapanti National Park and night at Hotel Quelitales

Although Quelitales is fantastic birding on its own, a visit to the nearby Tapanti National Park makes it that much better!

The mossy, beautiful middle elevation rainforests of Tapanti are excellent for mixed flocks and a wide variety of cloud forest species, many of which are uncommon. Some of the many birds to look for include Black-faced Solitaire, woodcreepers, Brown-billed Scythebill, barbets, and much more. With luck, you might even see an Ochre-breasted Antpitta, Streaked Xenops, foliage-gleaners, and other shy, uncommon species.

In sunny weather, this site and nearby areas can also be good for hawk-eagles, Barred Hawk, and other raptors.


Day 4. Drive over the mountains to the Talari Lodge in Perez Zeledon

buff-fronted-quail-do

After a morning birding and breakfast at Quelitales, you drive up and over the nearby majestic Talamanca Mountains. Lunch will be at the wonderful Casa Tangara dowii; a special reserve dedicated to birding and birders.

With luck, the group will be treated to wonderful views of cloudforest species at the feeder. These can include Yellow-thighed Brushfinch, Spangle-cheeked Tanager, Buff-fronted Quail-Dove, and, with luck, Buffy-crowned Wood-Partridge!

Lunch will be followed by a scenic drive through and over beautiful high elevation forests and treeline habitats. You might make a few stops on the way or head straight to birdy lodging. Feeder action could host Speckled Tanager and other species and, at night, there might be Tropical Screech-Owl and Common Potoo.


Day 5. Morning birding and transfer to Mary Hotel in Buenos Aires

Today, you’ll explore the birdy forests at Talari and in the nearby General Valley. Specialties will include a first real taste of south Pacific birds, you may see Scaled Pigeon, Orange-collared Manakin, Streaked Saltator, Pearl Kite, White-crested Coquette, and even Turquoise Cotinga.

The General Valley can be especially good for this fantastic, uncommon cotinga and we will watch for it at our hotel as well as spots around Perez Zeledon. We will eventually make our way to the grass savannahs near Buenos Aires and end the day looking for the local White-tailed Nightjar.


Day 6. Morning search for specialties and drive to Esquinas Rainforest Lodge

After an early breakfast, we make our way to the savannah habitats of the General Valley where we will work with a local guide to look for uncommon and localized species like Ocellated Crake and Rosy Thrush-Tanager.

Eventually, we will make our way over the scenic coastal cordillera for some afternoon birding in wetland habitats near Ciudad Neily.

These open hábitats host several uncommon and local species for Costa Rica including Veraguan Mango, Sapphire-throated Hummingbird, Brown-throated Parakeet, Savannah Hawk, and Lesser Yellow-headed Vulture among others. With luck, we might also see Paint-billed Crake.

On the drive to Esquinas Rainforest Lodge, we will keep an eye out for nocturnal species like Striped Owl and Common Potoo.

Dinner and night at Esquinas.


Day 7 and 8 Esquinas Rainforest Lodge and Rincon de Osa

This area is wonderful, a birdwatcher’s paradise in the South Pacific of Costa Rica!

Several endemic bird species like the Black-cheeked Ant-tanager, Charming Hummingbird, Yellow-billed, and Turquoise Cotinga occur along with many other species. Needless to say, this is an excellent place to enlarge a birder’s life list.

birding Costa Rica

During our stay at Esquinas, the lodge’s very birdy gardens, trails, and edge habitats should keep us entertained. A huge number of species are possible including various flycatchers, manakins, Black-cheeked Ant-Tanager, Baird’s Trogon, Golden-naped Woodpecker, raptors, and more.

Some of the other birds we will watch for include Blue-headed Parrot, Tiny Hawk, Spectacled Owl, and the uncommon undescribed “Puntarenas Screech-Owl”.

On our first full day at Esquinas, we will spend one full day birding around the lodge grounds. On our second day, we will pay an early morning visit to Rio Rincon to watch for the endangered Yellow-billed Cotinga, Turquoise Cotinga, and other specialties, and then spend the rest of the day back at Esquinas.

All meals and nights at Esquinas.


Day 9. Drive up the Pacific coast to Tarcoles Birding LodgeDay 9-10. Central Pacific (Night at Tarcoles Birding Lodge or similar)

After a final morning of early birding and breakfast, we will drive up the coast to Esquipulas Rainforest Lodge for lunch and chances at seeing birds like White-crested Coquette and other rainforest species.

After lunch, we continue moving north for a bit of late afternoon birding at our hotel, the Tarcoles Birding Lodge. True to its name, this spot has excellent birding, especially from a tower that overlooks patches of dry forest and wetlands in a river valley.

We could see Crane Hawk among other raptors.


Day 10. Carara NP in the AM, birding by boat in the afternoon. Night at Tarcoles Birding Lodge

While walking the easy trails in the rainforests of Carara National Park, we will watch for a healthy variety of lowland rainforest interior birds including the likes of Great Tinamou, Black-faced Antthrush, Streak-chested Antpitta, Rufous Piha, manakins, and more.

The boat trip is an excellent way to get leisurely views of waterbirds and many edge species. We will also have a chance at various raptors, and good chances of seeing Scarlet Macaws and many parrots in flight. We also hope to see at least 3 species of Kingfishers and will have more chances at mangrove specialties like Mangrove Vireo, Mangrove Yellow Hummingbird, and Mangrove Hummingbird.


Day 11. Final birding in the morning and drive to Villa san Ignacio near the airport

This morning, we hope to catch up on dry forest species we have yet to see. We’ll look for everything from Crane Hawk to Spot-bellied Bobwhite, the spectacular White-throated Magpie-Jay, and Black-headed Trogon.

birding Costa Rica
Black-headed Trogon.

Night and dinner at Villa San Ignacio.


Day 12. Flights back home

Transfer to the airport for the flight back home.

One of the best things about this fantastic tour is that room is still available! To experience this wealth of uncommon mega birds in Costa Rica, please contact me at information@birdingcraft.com or contact Hillstar Nature directly at info@hillstarnature.com

You can also see more information about this carefully designed birding tour at Hillstar Nature.

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bird finding in Costa Rica birds to watch for in Costa Rica planning birding trip Costa Rica

Recent Mega Birds in Costa Rica

What’s a mega bird? Aren’t all birds intrinsically mega? Who invented the “mega” term anyways? Alas, as with much of the birding-associated lexicon, we’ll probably never know who that unintended mover and shaker was. Worse, we don’t know which bird species provoked them to coin the term nor, how they deployed it.

That doesn’t really matter but it would be nice to know. For those of us interested in birding history, we wouldn’t mind knowing if they said, “That Red-footed Falcon is a real mega”!, or if they were so beyond mind blown by focusing in on a choice elusive and unexpected species that they could utter nothing more than a hazy dazed and eye-glazed “Mega…”.

birding Costa Rica
This is my poor photo of a mega RVG Cuckoo. The blurry nature of the photo seems fitting for its highly elusive nature (at least that’s what I tell myself).

Whatever the case, we got the word and it must not be abused. Or, heck, birding is pretty much ruleless, use it however you want. This is your birding life after all, you bird how you do. However, if “we” were so inclined to define “mega”, in my opinion (decidedly not IMHO because that sounds too much like a dang pancake chain), I would say that the word refers to particularly unexpected, automatically rare, and/or especially elusive birds.

In other words, a surprise bird sighting to knock your birding socks off and give you a personal thrill. Megas would be birds like the Harpy Eagle, Yellow Rail, and the Bukidnon Woodcock (yeah, that’s real). On account of their elusive and ultra sneaky nature, the Neomorphus ground-cuckoos also fit the mega bill as do localized and ultra rare birds like the Cherry-throated Tanager (although that one might merit mega-mega or triple mega crown status, there’s like two dozen left).

The megaist of the mega birds would be species believed to be extinct, awaiting rediscovery, or that have never been previously seen. Kinglet Calyptura is a prime candidate along with maybe an unknown bird or two in remote parts of Bolivia.

As for Costa Rica, we got our own set of megas, a few of which have been recently seen.

Aplomado Falcon near Jaco

Although this lanky falcon isn’t rare on the global page, it’s always a mega for Costa Rica. We probably get a few each year and one or two might be briefly seen. They seem to be juveniles likely wandering in from the north and don’t usually stay long.

A few days ago, one of those choice cool falcons was found by Tina Van Dusen, a local birder in the Playa Hermosa, Jaco area. This isn’t the first mega she has found, we’re glad she keeps looking and reporting the birds she turns up around Playa Hermosa!

This falcon has been hanging out in the open fields near Mistico, a housing site near Playa Hermosa. Thankfully, a good number of local birders have seen it, I hope it sticks around long enough for me and Maryllen to see it too.

If you go, watch for it perched on posts, on top of lone trees, or flying around the fields. If you see a gaggle of birders, that might work too.

Crested Eagle at Pitilla Biological Station

Whoah! Yes! The just as difficult, slightly smaller version of the Harpy was seen by experienced local birders at Pitilla Biological Station. Although they don’t have a picture, their description is spot on and they have enough experience with other raptors to make the right call.

This isn’t just an automatic mega sighting by merit of the species involved, it’s also a fantastic mega sighting because we have no idea how many (few) Crested Eagles still occur in Costa Rica. One had never been seen in that area before but it’s the least bit surprising that they saw one where they did. Pitilla is one of the most remote, intact, accessible areas of lowland and foothill rainforest on the Caribbean slope. Not by coincidence, it’s also the only place where both Speckled Mourner and Ocellated Poorwill have been recently seen and not that far from a Harpy Eagle sighting in 2017.

All these species are indicators of healthy, intact habitat, the main question I have is where that Crested Eagle came from. Did it wander in from somewhere else? Are there a few hanging on in the remote forests of the northern volcanoes? Hopefully there are enough to maintain a small population.

Gray-headed Piprites at Rancho Naturalista

The piprites is another classic mega for Costa Rica. Although it used to be slightly more frequent, the mini pseudo manakin has never been common and is weirdly local. The reasons for its localization are surely not the slightest bit weird for the bird but they sure are evasive for us humans.

It has become very hard to predict where this bird might occur other than at its known and regular haunts. The best haunt seems to be a site near Turrialba where local guide Steven Montenegro regularly sees it. Other regular spots are in that same general region including one of the best known birding lodges in Costa Rica; good old Rancho Naturalista.

Yes, recently, one was seen there, hopefully, it will stick around for lots more birders to see it. If not, you could always contact Steven or try Vista Aves; the guide there also knows sites for this unassuming mega.

Migrating Swallows and other birds from the north

No, they don’t fit the mega definition but what can I say? Watching dozens of swallows fly over the house was a mega experience for me, especially after a short, successful hospital stay. I’m still alive and so are they; Cliff Swallows with deep chestnut throats, Bank Swallows looking svelte, and beautiful peach Barn Swallows zipping from the fields of Ohio straight on through Costa Rica.

Wood-pewees hawking bugs from perches, the first of many Baltimore Orioles and Summer Tanagers getting reaccustomed to their tropical side of life, and good numbers of cheerful chipping Yellow Warblers. In which forests did the flycatchers sing their lazy summer songs? Where did the orioles and tanagers flutter in June maples and oaks? Where did the warblers grace the northern willows?

I like to know but no matter right now. It only matters that they made it here and, if they stay, that they survive the winter in these tropical realms.

To learn more about birding at the sites mentioned in this post while supporting this blog, check out my bird finding guide for Costa Rica. I hope to see some mega birds with you here!

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bird finding in Costa Rica Birding Costa Rica seabirding in Costa Rica

Seawatching at Puntarenas- September 20, 2025

Costa Rica is flanked by two oceans; drive quick enough, get lucky with traffic and weather and you can visit both in a day. Not stopping to look at any of the hundreds of bird species in between would be an incredible birding shame but, if you were so marine inclined, you could do it.

Or, you could do better at managing your birding time and go seawatching! Sure, in Costa Rica, you could certainly seawatch on both coasts. You might not see much but there’s always a certain degree of therapeutic benefits associated with oggling the waves. The funny thing about seawatching is that although you can technically watch for birds on any coast, not all coasts have the birds, at least not near shore, or in enough numbers to breach birding appeal.

Take Costa Rica for example, we’ve got many wonderful spots to watch those tropical waves but few of them really bring the birds. Yeah, no matter where you look, you’ll probably see something with feathers but, more variety calls for strategic spots at strategic times (just like any seawatching hotspot).

One of the best spots for seawatching in Costa Rica is an old port city situated on a narrow peninsula that points into the Gulf of Nicoya, just about where the inner and outer parts of the gulf meet. It’s a sort of a tropical headland at a joining of waters and an estuary replete with sand bars. Now if those sand bars were closer Puntarenas would be a major shorebird watching hotspot. Alas, the birds are a bit too far to properly observe them but, the port is still good for scanning the water, for getting in some good old fashioned seawatching.

Knowing that Least Terns should still be moving through and, dearly wanting to see some of those dainty birds as they make their annual journey south, yesterday, we paid a morning visit to the Puntarenas lighthouse. The drive to the coast was slowed a bit by truck traffic but we still got there by 7 a.m., still early enough to catch some of the morning seabird action.

These are some highlights and thoughts from this birding sojourn.

Take a closer look

Upon arrival, I looked at the water and saw nary a Royal Tern. Those birds are a given, not seeing them did not bode well. “At least there was the ocean” I thought, “maybe something will fly by or I’ll see a fish”.

After exiting the car and briefly conversing with the car watcher guy (aka “watcheemon”) to yes, assure that I as aware he was watching over my vehicle, despite my low bar hopes, I set up the scope and started scanning with binos. Lo and behold, the birds were there, they were just mostly horizon birds, mostly things flying way out there over distant water.

But there were a lot, they looked like innumerable gnats on the horizon.

The ferry would have been pretty darn good

Upon seeing that lots of birds were out there, I realized it would have been a good day to take the ferry. Why hadn’t I thought of that? That’s right, it was because we would have had to leave the house by 3 and weren’t too keen on going back and forth across the gulf. But, if only we had!

The birds were out there and some. It looked promising and was more or less the same time of year when I had my best birding ferry ride some years ago.

Least Terns

It didn’t take long before a few Least Terns flew by; tiny terns with quick wingbeats, all in dapper white winter plumage brushed with bits of black. Throughout my 90 minutes of seawatching, small groups flew past and foraged by the distant sand bar. Even at a distance, it was easy to pick out their distinctive, repetitive quick dive foraging.

I put down 50 for the list but there was probably more. It was fun to compare them with the most abundant bird on the scene, another small tern often found in the Gulf of Nicoya. It’s a bird that nests in northern marshes, one that brings back visions of smart-looking birds hovering and swooping over the Tonawanda wetlands.

Clouds of Black Terns

A typical feeding flock of Black Terns in the gulf.

Like I was saying, the Black Tern was the big bird on the scene, the one that ruled my seawatching day. Small numbers constantly flew past, most fairly far off shore. The largest numbers were way out there, clouds of them. In one such cloud, at a wavery 60 X magnification, as much as I tried to pick out another species, all I could see was a massive Brown Pelican plowing through the Black Tern ranks to feast on the same unseen sardine banquet.

A few other groups foraged a bit closer and in better light and those were the ones to focus on. Those were the flocks that would have been exciting to watch from the ferry deck. Although such flocks can be solely composed of Black Terns, they are also the situations that attract other, less common species, including the ones mentioned below.

I should also mention putting down 1,000 Black Terns on my eBird list. That was a pretty conservative estimate, there were probably a lot more.

A few distant pelagic birds

A Brown Noddy from another day shares a piece of driftwood with a Black Tern.

Fortunately, the scanning paid off, the seawatching revealed some of the seabird bounty from the Gulf of Nicoya. Try as I did to pick up a storm-petrel or two, no luck there. However, staring at the Black Terns and carefully panning the waves did turn up a couple Bridled Terns (!). The distant looks ruled out divining their age but that’s alright, I’m fine with ageless Bridled Terns, smiling with picking out larger, longer winged, gray backed terns that sliced through the tern flocks.

I was also alright with a Brown Noddy doing the same; a larger, dark brown bird foraging with the smaller migrants from the north. The third pelagic bird species was hardly a glimpse but I couldn’t unsee it, couldn’t deny noticing the fluttering flight and banking of another regular in these estuarine waters; a Galapagos Shearwater.

It was less than a second but it was enough to know I saw it. I bet more were out there and who knows what else? I hadn’t picked up any Sabine’s or phalaropes or jaegers but those are moving through too, might have been some visible from the ferry.

No ferry for me but the seawatching was still good, still therapeutic and highlighted with a jumping stingray and a pair of surfacing Bottlenose Dolphins. It was good stuff, I am grateful.

To learn more about birding Puntarenas and hundreds of other sites in Costa Rica, please support this blog by purchasing my Costa Rica birding site guide. I hope to see you here!

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News and Tips from Recent Birding in Costa Rica

A few days ago, I returned from a week of birding in Costa Rica. This wasn’t any old week of excellent birding at commonly visited hotspots like Arenal, Sarapiqui, and Cano Negro. No, this was a target road trip, a custom birding voyage structured around “the missing”. Those hallowed species would be any birds not seen on previous trips to Costa Rica.

As such, they could only be encountered at scattered locations, typically, places too far flung to visit on previous trips. But, we had already birded the close spots, had already seen most of what could be seen relatively nearby (and even then, not all!). Reaching the far off places had become necessary, at least if we wanted to see funny sounding birds like Stub-tailed Spadebill, Elegant Trogon, and Ivory-billed Woodcreeper.

In a birding nutshell, we went from the Sarapiqui lowlands to cloud forest in the central highlands, on to Liberia in northwestern Costa Rica, and then way south to the gateway to the Osa and Ciudad Neily (and then back, as well as a day trip to Centro Manu). The following reflects some of the highlights and tips from this custom birding journey, more or less following the timeframe of the trip.

Cerulean Warblers and some other migrants

I was hoping to catch up with the annual fall passage of mini sky-blue beauties. The height of their movements coincided with our birding days, I figured we’d probably see a few but, since this is birding, you just never know!

Fortunately, it all worked out, birding probability paid off in three places. There were the brief glimpses of pleasant greenish backed females and a neatly breast banded male in Centro Manu (where they consort with Lesser Greenlets- scandalous), the bold female that uncharacteristically showed in eye level vegetation at Tirimbina, and the fantastic, very welcome male that gave perfect views at Cinchona.

Although not quite so glamorous, other migrants were around too; a handful of Red-eyed Vireos, Blackburnians, Black and white Warblers, pewees, and a few others. In southern Costa Rica, there was also a bunch of Sulphur-bellied Flycatchers. It was pretty cool and birder dreamy to see a dozen doing their hefty flycatcher thing in one special tree!

Tirimbina- still great for Great Tinamou and antbirds

We spent a morning at Tirimbina to look for various fairly challenging lowland birds. Luckily, some made an appearance. One of the best was one of the birds that this private refuge is often good for- yee friendly whistling Great Tinamou. After a juvenile had flushed, we were pleased to see an adult doing us a favor by sticking around for great views.

Other nice target birds included antwrens, antvireos, and seriously lucking out with Ocellated Antbird. In roughly the same spot where I had encountered an antswarm nearly a year before, lo and behold, I see a couple streams of Army Ants trying to sneak by!

After careful investigation and whistling like an Ocellated, thankfully, two of the wonderfully spotted, blue-faced birds appeared for some fine looks.

Fair birding on the San Rafael de Varablanca road

The cloud forest next to Braulio Carrillo National Park weren’t quite as birdy as I would have liked but, then again, I probably expect too much. No quetzal but we did have excellent views of Black-breasted Wood-Quail, had a nice mixed flock, and heard White-fronted Tyrannulet.

This site always turns up some good stuff, I cover it and lots of other places in my Costa Rica bird finding ebook, “How to See, Find, and Identify Birds in Costa Rica”.

Visiting Santa Rosa National Park

Santa Rosa National Park is an excellent, big area of tropical dry forest in northern Costa Rica. It’s around 35 minutes north of Liberia and worth the visit!

We went there hoping for several dry forest species and indeed, lucked out with Thicket Tinamou on the main road, Ivory-billed Woodcreeper, and Stub-tailed Spadebill among other birds. Although it was overall fairly birdy everywhere, some of the best spots were the old growth dry forest on the drive in, and the loop trail near the Casona.

You can stop on the main road but be very careful of speeding vehicles. Also, although the entrance road doesn’t have a gate, you still need to make reservations in advance and pay the fee at the park entrance (only with cards and only from 8 to 330). Reservations were easy enough and the park rangers were also very friendly and helpful.

Las Trancas- not as accessible, not as good

Las Trancas is the name for a farming area on the road from Liberia and the airport to the Playa Hermosa area. In the past, rice fields there have been excellent for Jabiru, rails, and more. Unfortunately, as I saw from this recent sojourn, most of the rice has been converted to unbirdy sugar cane and the side roads are gated.

Needless to say, we didn’t have much there. However, the other part of the farm that still has rice fields and birds can still be visited albeit with a local guide. We paid a brief visit and managed distant Jabiru and a few other birds. To check this great area out and maybe see Spotted Rail, contact local guide Javier Perez Chaves.

BONUS SNOWY PLOVER AT CALDERA!

As befits the find, this subtitle gets the big letters. During low tide, a sand bar forms in the lagoon at Mata de Limon (aka Caldera). Sometimes it has several birds, other times no but it’s always worth checking. On September 9th, that checking paid off with a very rare for Costa Rica Snowy Plover.

The bird was distant and the sun was hot but carefully scoping that bunch of Semi Plovs was worth the sweat and staring. Ghost pale, think dark beak and gray legs…year bird success!

I doubt it will stick around that spot but you never know. I hope it turns up again, might be in Tarcoles.

Cotingas at Rincon de Osa

In Costa Rica birding circles, Rincon de Osa is known as the place to be for Yellow-billed Cotinga. Thanks to two fruiting figs, it most definitely was on our visit. Belying their scarce and possibly critically endangered status, the surreal white birds swooped back and forth, sometimes near eye level. Most were males, I only saw one, maybe two females at most.

Turquoise Cotinga was also present but, amazingly, we missed it by an inch! As we watched the white birds, another birder was taking pictures of the blue one on the other side of the tree. He assumed we had seen it and, sadly, the birds snuck off and never came back, not even on the following morning.

Quiet birding at Rincon de Osa

On another note, overall, the forest birding at Rincon was pretty quiet. Yes, we still saw Crane Hawk, Gray-lined Hawk, and some other good birds but it was pretty quiet. I only hope that’s related to season and not fewer birds but, I worry. On past visits, I have easily recorded 100 plus species in a few hours.

An absence of owls and other night birds

In general, we had every few nocturnal birds. If we would have looked more, we probably would have found some but, checking a couple nights turned up nothing, not even a Pauraque.

Ciudad Neily rocks and birding rolls

This small city in southern Costa Rica was birdy as ever. The “hospital road” had Savannah Hawk and other regulars but no dice with Paint-billed Crake (maybe too wet to concentrate them?). Unfortunately, the Coto area was too flooded and muddy to access but the birding just outside of town was good.

Parrots and other birds flew over town at dawn and dusk and roadside birding in forest just outside of town was productive for a good number of rainforest species. As a bonus, we also had great looks at Central American Squirrel Monkeys!

After Ciudad Neily birding, we made the long drive back to San Jose, thankfully, with nary an incident. Speaking of incidents, lately heavy rains have caused local flooding near Fortuna and other places, and landslides on the Route 32 San Jose-Guapiles highway. Be careful and make sure you get your birding in during the sunny morning! By 1 or 2, the weather takes a drastic turn and pours down buckets.

Happy birding, I hope to see you here! Here’s a trip report to whet the appetite.

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Birding Costa Rica migration

Reminders of Bird Migration in Costa Rica

A lot of birds winter in Costa Rica. Go birding from late October to early March and you should run into Summer Tanagers, orioles, Philadelphia Vireos and a warbler parade of winter plumaged Chestnut-sided, Black and white, Tennessee, Wilson’s, Black-throated Green, and Yellow Warblers among other species.

There’ll also be Barn Swallows zipping low over open fields, a healthy array of shorebirds probing mud flats, and Yellow-bellied Flycatchers chipping from the woods. At the moment, most of those winter birds have yet to arrive. For the most part, there’ll still entertaining birders and ravaging caterpillar populations up north. They don’t usually get their fill until later this month, making it here in bulk by early October.

Barn Swallow living it up in Costa Rica.

However, we don’t have to wait until the month of pumpkin spice to see migrants. A fair number are already here, most making a stop on their route to South America. They can sneak through and the numbers are much smaller than the October avian rush but the birds are out there, available for birders taking a closer look.

This past week saw a nice little push of transient migrants and early arrivals. These were some of the reminders that migration is happening in Costa Rica, that birds are on the move through Quetzalandia.

Pewees on perches

Lately, I’ve been checking my local patch of urban green space, hoping to notice hints of the northern migrant vanguard. If I was birding in better habitat, I’m sure I’d see more but, you’ve got to work with what you got. Around here, that means a small bit of trees on a riparian zone, and a nearby patch of a park.

At least that’s what I’ve got within walking distance. There are better vegetated spots a bit further afield (and I do hope to visit them too) but they require more time and effort than easy, early morning strolls.

During those strolls, I have noticed a few migrants but wondered where the pewees were. Those semi-crested, easy-plumaged flycatchers pass through Costa Rica in substantial numbers. I suppose it’s a tad early, most aren’t here yet but I did see my first of three migrant Contopus this past week.

Around Varablanca, an out of place thingee on the tip top of a tall snag turned into an expected Olive-sided Flycatcher. I always like seeing those conifer birds, as a kid, they were one of the “good ones” to see, one of the uncommon flycatchers. I saw my first perched on a typical tip of a snag during a summer visit to Algonquin Provincial Park, sometime 80s. A while ago now but burned into the memory banks by additional sightings from that same boggy spot; otters playing, a pair of lifer White-winged Crossbills, and a glimpse of a distant Black Bear crossing the track far ahead.

I see Olive-sideds here in Costa Rica, the tip top birds that demand three beers elsewhere, and wonder what they saw on their wild and beautiful breeding grounds. I wondered the same for the other pewees also seen this week; a Western Wood-Pewee (WEWP there it is…) on the snag in front of Cinchona, and an Eastern on the end of a stick yesterday evening.

Did they see bears too? Imagine the glittering tanager parties they’ll see once they reach the Andes!

Dickcissel whispers

Now is the time to hear Dickcissels. I heard my first of the fall yesterday morning and it was par for the course; a slight buzzy call from somewhere above, an afterthought above zinc-roofed homes, Green-breasted Mango feeding from orange flowers topping a lone tree, and White-winged Dove quickening over concrete.

Once in a while, a Dickcissel even lands around here, no doubt much to its chagrin. It won’t find food on these cinder block walls, no rice or weedy fields to visit. Most whisper and keep moving, keep flying south and east until they find suitably marshy spots to their liking.

A handful of warblers

I figured my first warbler would be aYellow Warbler. That’s usually the case although Black and whites are pretty early too. I have had a few of those but no Yellow yet. Should be one nearby, at least any day now.

The other scant early bird warblers I have seen are American Redstart, a cool female Canada Warbler in the local park, Blackburnian in cloud forest, and expected Louisiana Waterthrush near a mountain stream.

Other local birders have noticed a few other warblers, the best of the bunch being a possible Yellow-throated. Now that would be a nice find, it’s a rare bird in Costa Rica.

A push of Ceruleans

At the moment, we are in the heart of Cerulean Warbler migration. That’s one of the main birds I’m hoping to find in my neighborhood, my biggest hope while scanning fully foliaged trees. No luck yet but a few have been seen nearby, there’s probably one or more within a few miles as I write.

However, the best places to see these special birds are where other birders have been reporting them; forested middle elevations and the Caribbean slope. I might get there soon, really hope I see one.

Buff-breasted Sandpipers, Least Terns, and other coastal birds

The biggest migration news was a flock of 17 Buff-breasted Sandpipers from Chomes. Although that happens every year, you still gotta be lucky to coincide your visit to Chomes with their’s. Those seriously long distance migrants are here one day, gone the next, and there’s not a heck of a lot of them.

Least Terns are also moving through, now is a great time to see them on the Pacific coast along with other coastal migrants, shorebirds for the most part. However, if you do some seawatching, you might also get lucky and see a Sabine’s.

Swallows and other species

The first of droves of Hirundines have also shown up. I’ve seen Barns and some Cliffs, as usual, for whatever reason, flying from west to east, often low over the neighborhood houses.

I also saw one other swallow, unfortunately, a kick myself bird. It came in so low, I didn’t notice it until it was too close for binos (or I was just too early morning lazy to raise them). At first glance, I also foolishly took it to be a common and expected Blue and white Swallow. However, when it flew overhead, I realized it didn’t have a darn vent so I figured, oh, my first Bank Swallow.

BUT, while looking for the dark breast band, I realized it didn’t have one and was all white below. Um, around here, a migrant swallow like that is either a Tree or a Violet-green, both rare species for Costa Rica. Sadly, I couldn’t see anything more revealing before it flew directly into the sun and out of my life. I suspect it was a Violet-green, a major migrant prize and year bird but, I was too lackadaisical with the binos (proceeds to kick self).

Other species have included my first Eastern Kingbird of the fall (which was insisting on hanging with a pari of Tropical Kingbirds that kept chasing it away), and others have seen flocks of Swallow-tailed Kites and some other birds.

Migration is definitely happening in Costa Rica, what else is out there? I hope I get the chance to find out.