This small bright blue & yellow bird landed for 30 seconds or so in my Yellow Bell Tree Wednesday and I managed to get a few shots before he left. He is the male Spot-crowned Euphonia (eBird link), endemic to Costa Rica and the northern fringes of Panama, only on the Pacific Slopes, and just my third time to photograph one! First time in my garden! 🙂 My other places were at Esquinas Rainforest lodge at Piedras Blancas NP north of Golfito and at Hacienda Guachipelin, Rincón de la Vieja NP in Guanacaste near Liberia. I go back to Esquinas in July for my 83rd birthday and expect to see them again! 🙂
One of my all-time favorite bird photos was of a female Spot-crowned Euphonia eating a berry at Esquinas Lodge! See that and the other shots in my Spot-Crowned Euphonia Gallery! Now here’s 3 shots from my garden Wednesday . . .
Spot-crowned Euphonia, male, Atenas, Costa Rica
Above he’s looking down, next looking up and the third looking right into the camera before flying off! 🙂
He landed in one of my Nance trees for only a few seconds and then flew away, never showing his face, which can help with ID! 🙂 But after a lot of research online and in my books I am pretty certain that this fellow is a Great Crested Flycatcher which we can have here as both immigrants from the north this time of year or non-breeding residents year-a-round. But this is my first time to see one here, though I saw one in the states in the past.
Great Crested Flycatcher, Atenas, Costa Rica
For the birders reading, notice the distinctive white wing-bars and the slight reddish-orange tinting on the lower edge of his wing. Only Great Crested, Brown and Ash-throated Flycatchers have both of those, eliminating the similar Yellow-bellied Elaenia, Dusky-capped Flycatcher and Northern Beardless Tyrannulet. Plus none of those have this bright a yellow belly or this dark of a brown crest which is also the two reasons I eliminate the Brown and Ash-throated Flycatchers!
Sometimes bird ID becomes like scientific detective work! 🙂 But I’m pretty confident of this ID, even without a face shot which would have shown no eye ring and a slight bit of pink at the base of his bill. Read about him on eBird. And you who live in the Eastern U.S. are possibly familiar with him as a common bird there, as shown on eBird’s map, and where I’ve seen him before.
My Costa Rica Bird Galleries by Species have many helpful characteristics for birders or anyone interested in Costa Rica birds that no other online gallery has nor does any book other than maybe Aves de Costa Rica by Garrigues & Dean and it, like its English version is out of date with many incorrect bird names.
One example of 360 galleries. Note English, Spanish & Scientific Names!
My bird galleries have:
Photos of 360+ species of birds in Costa Rica arranged by taxonomy families as in the Princeton Field Guide: Birds of Central America, the most up-to-date birding book for Costa Rica at this time.
Up-to-date official English Names (constantly changing) based on the latest from eBird
Spanish Names as given in the only Spanish bird book for Costa Rica, Aves de Costa Rica. Note that these have not been changing like the English names and thus often parallel the old English names. PLUS I include the Otros nombres en español that are included in the above Spanish bird book since different regions of the country use different names.
The Latin Scientific Name of every bird has recently been added to my gallery of Costa Rica Birds.
And as I try to do with all my photos in all my galleries, I have included the specific location in which each bird was photographed. That can particularly help birders who are looking for a specific species they have not yet seen or photographed.
All of the above information is included on each photo in the galleries as Keywords making searches easier.
Downloading photo files is free from any of my galleries. Just look for the downward pointing arrow below an enlarged image or use the old fashion way with a right click.
You can order quality prints or wall arton metal or canvas of any of the images you consider good enough for those purposes. I have some bad images just to show that a bird was seen in a particular place, but some of my images make great wall art and I personally prefer the ones printed on metal. This is a service of SmugMug Galleries with Bay Photos. This is not a source of income for me and thus my markup is only $1.
There is also a link at the top of every page to my Bookstore where you can find find my books of bird photos and many other Costa Rica subjects!
If you love the birds of Costa Rica, I hope you will find my photo galleries helpful to you in studying and learning the locations of these many birds!
These are just the ones I recently photographed with the Saltator and Yellow Warbler seen less often but not really rare and the other 4 regulars seen almost daily now with the White-winged Dove and Chachalaca also fairly regular but no pix this time. Now that the wind is starting to lessen, I expect to see a lot more birds! There are few butterflies now, but their “big season” here seems to be June to October, so I look forward to that also! Here’s one bird for the email notice and 5 more below that online . . .
Rufous-tailed Hummingbird, Atenas, Costa Rica. Note the long white tongue sticking out of the red and black bill! 🙂
And as a nature lover, I do not always embrace “progress” that henders nature, but as always, I learn to live with it! 🙂 This old dirt country road called “Calle Nueva” winds over three or four hills through the woods and farms on the western edge of Pueblo Atenas running from the western side of town to the nearby village of Rio Grande at the entrance to Ruta 27, our controlled access highway between San Jose and Jaco Beach. This narrow country dirt road has been considered an emergency exit road in case of a disaster requiring evacuation. Now it is about to become a major street or road to enter or exit Atenas. They first graded and widened it to 9 meters taking a few trees and lots of wild flower with their backhoes, graders and chainsaws. Now they have started at the Rio Grande end widening it to 14 meters and paving it! Working this way! And more than half finished! Already traffic has increased and when all is paved it will stay busy!
Where I enter Calle Nueva, just past Colegio Técnico on Avenida 10, with new black gravel up to the little one lane bridge where it is back to the plain red dirt again.
Of course I am disappointed that I am about to lose my little “shady lane” country road for birding and butterflies along with other nature photography, but even with pavement and more cars it will for a while have more birds and other nature than city streets, just gradually the farms along this road will be turned into housing developments as more foreigners move here in both retirement like me AND now so many younger adults who work on the internet and can live anywhere are choosing to live here! 🙂 It’s all part of our big changing world! At least I’m already living in one of those more desirable places in the world to live! 🙂
Recently graded and widened to 9 meters and soon to 14 meters and paved!
I will continue to walk this road for its nature until there is no more nature. The additional people, traffic and greater speed of vehicles will discourage the birds and other animals in time, but for now it is still a nature path, even when the pavement goes down. And I will continue to document here the birds and butterflies I find through these woods and farms, but for you who live here, be aware than “progress” is coming! 🙂
More photos of the road below from my March 10 sunrise walk . . .
7 days ago, Friday, March 10, I left my house at 5:40 am and took the city streets for the 20 minute walk to Calle Nueva alongside Roca Verde but with no entrance from our development. I saw a few birds on the city streets enroute and then a little past Colegio Técnico (our technical high school on 10th Ave.) I always start seeing birds and continue to as I cross the stream and go up the hill alongside Roca Verde. I’ll do a post about the road tomorrow and explain why I think birds have decreased there and will more in the future, but for today here’s the 11 birds I got useable photos of for the blog and darn it! I missed snapping the 2 Motmots I saw! 🙂
First a photo I consider kind of “artsy” – a black bird on black & silver power lines with the morning sunrise turning the clouds in front of him black & orange as he seems to stare at them in unbelief! 🙂 Sort of dramatic, don’t you think? 🙂
Great-tailed Grackle watching the sunrise on Calle Nueva in Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica.
This female Summer Tanager seems to live in or near my garden, as I have been seeing her feeding and resting in my Nance Tree for months now. A regularly visiting bird seems like an old friend and I’m glad she likes the flowers, seeds, and fruit of this tree at different times of the year.
Summer Tanager female, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica
See my different Summer Tanager photos from around the year here in Atenas and from 3 other parts of Costa Rica in my Summer Tanager GALLERY. Always more females than the bright red males.
¡Pura Vida!
Blog post DATE “disclaimer” or “truth in reporting” : When writing so many posts about my Tortuguero visit in February, I gradually had several days worth ahead, up to two weeks worth, and so now the “daily sharings” from my little casita garden and walks through Atenas, Alajuela Provincia, Costa Rica are being written several days ahead of time. For example, this post was written on March 2. And if I have a down day with no post, the flow will continue! 🙂 My life of being “Retired in Costa” is almost daily recorded in my blog posts and totally collected in my Photo Gallery by subjects and trip galleries. Sharing photos of my interactions with nature is my life now as displayed in that online gallery.
THANK YOU for following my blog and your interest in my retirement life and photography! It has been a real joy now for more than eight years and there’s more to come! The website stats say I have 473 blog subscribers plus the 650 friends on Facebook that receive a link and the stats say that beyond reading the email notice and Facebook link photo, my blog website gets over 2,000 visits a month, with 28 comments and 218 “Likes” which only other WordPress bloggers can give. So blogging my retirement love of nature in Costa Rica has been very fulfilling and fun for me! And I was surprised at how many people in Costa Rica follow the blog when a large number showed up at the December JIT Art Show! That was a real joy! And that will continue this year as my only one time a year to sell photos in person.
I am not in business to sell my photos(It’s a hobby!), though they are always available in many formats through my gallery with only a dollar “markup” for me, plus in photo books in my Bookstore (also with only $1 markup), and a few novelty items in my CafePress shop (also with only $1 markup). So shop online if you like my photos! 🙂 Available for your pleasure, not my profit! 🙂
I have kind of quit evaluating lodges and hotels on TripAdvisor like I used to do after every trip and in some ways I’m finding it more difficult to “rank” lodges, like I did earlier by just the number of birds I photograph there.
At more than 82 and 1/2 years old, I’m looking for comfort more than in earlier adventures and simply do not go camping anymore, not to mention backpacking. So a comfortable room and good food are more important to me now, even though photographing nature still comes first. 🙂
Tortuga Lodge and Gardens, Tortuguero NP, Costa Rica
First, I Changed How I Get There & Back
Most of the lodges provide a free shuttle bus or van from any hotel in San Jose, including at the SJO Airport (where I have them pick me up at the Hampton Inn). Then van drives you to Guápiles for breakfast and then on to the La Pavona Boat Dock near Cariari, 22 kms (13.7 miles) north of Guápiles. Then you boat to your lodge in one of the lodge’s boats, an hour and a half to 2-hour boat trip which is a fun adventure the first time. I did that the first three times going twice to Laguna Lodgeand then once to Turtle Beach Lodge, though my return from Turtle Beach was much easier as I chose to fly back on Sansa from the tiny airport in Tortuguero. This time I chose to fly both ways at around $200 round-trip. Much faster and more relaxing plus I love the views and photo possibilities from the plane window! Plus small planes are their own kind of adventure! And it just happens that the lodge I chose this time is across the river from the “Airport” or little landing strip by the ocean.
I Chose For Better Room & Food This Time
The first two lodges I have visited in Tortuguero were just basic camp cabins (fine for me) and with average or maybe a little above average buffet-style food. But as I get older I want more comfort and better food.
So I chose the most expensive lodge there, Tortuga Lodge and Gardens, a BOENA Property with 4 upscale “wilderness lodges” in Costa Rica including Lapa Rio which used to be run by National Geographic and my favorite lodge in Monteverde (I’ve tried 3), the Monteverde Lodge and Gardens that I stayed in before it became BOENA. At over $400 a night including all 3 meals, this was my most expensive lodge yet, though I’ve been favoring other lodges more like it recently. 🙂
The room was the best yet in Tortuguero! So Tortuga Lodge won me over with the large, spacious room with private terrace overlooking the river and a back window looking into the rainforest. Very comfortable King Bed and large bathroom with huge rain shower. Strong WiFi capable of rapidly uploading my photos to the blog and even a nice desk for my laptop! So Tortuga Lodge & Gardens wins on room and excellent early maid service! In one or both of the other lodges I had to go to the lobby or restaurant for WiFi.
The food was also by far the best yet in Tortuguero! Though I had one complaint about the dry chicken and fish and tough, rubbery large shrimp at some dinners, everything else was absolutely delicious and well-prepared with a lot of choices for all three meals, including a variety of appetizers, salads, soups and desserts! It was generally the kind of fine, gourmet food you expect at their high prices.
Guides and Tours About Equal
Their Guides & Tours were as good as the other two lodges. Every guide I’ve had at all three lodges have been excellent as were their tours! So this reason for going would not make either of the three lodges a big winner exactly, though both Laguna and Turtle Beach are literally on the beach which is a big plus for me and would be more so in turtle season. Plus both are more back in the jungle than Tortuga AND Turtle Beach has its own private canals and a bigger property which is another advantage they have and I saw more wildlife there. In fact one of my tours this time was in Laguna 4 which is next to Turtle Beach Lodge and was this guide’s favorite place to go. Hmmm. If Turtle Beach had the higher quality rooms and food, I would probably prefer them.
My room at Tortuga Lodge on left, downstairs.
Bottom Line
I think Tortuga Lodge and Gardens is overpriced, but I enjoyed my 4 nights there and would consider it again for the comfort as I would consider the other two for the wildlife tours and I might even try a different place next time, like Mawamba Lodge which I’ve heard good things about, if I even get to go back to Tortuguero. 🙂
These fit with the larger ones already shared and though there are more that I saw and even tried to photograph, these are all I will try to share of the birds. Some other wildlife next! 🙂
Turkey Vulture, Tortuguero NP, Limón, Costa RicaGreat Green Macaw, Tortuguero NP, Limón, Costa RicaMontezuma Oropendola, Tortuguero NP, Limón, Costa RicaGreat Kiskadee, Tortuguero NP, Limón, Costa Rica
In case you thought there are only water birds at Tortuguero (Wetlands) National Park, remember the three species of toucans I’ve already posted and here are 5 species of small land birds I managed to catch, mostly at the lodge, and tomorrow I will share 4 more larger land birds including the endangered Green Macaw to finish out the 33 species of birds I photographed at Tortuguero, a really good birding spot! And there are several birds I photographed on other trips there that I did not get this time, plus much other wildlife like the River Otter on two other trips but not this time. Next to Corcovado NP, Tortuguero may have the highest concentration of wildlife of any other national park in Costa Rica (except maybe that inaccessible park that straddles the Panama border) with no public roads into it. You just have to work at getting photos of mostly elusive wildlife! A few lucky people have even seen a Jaguar there! 🙂
