This is the first of three new species for me that I photographed in my garden on the 17th & 18th of this month! The other two coming in the next two days. At first glance, all brown Skippers seem to look alike, but there are so many variations and this is one of those! 🙂 Butterfliesandmoths.org just uses the scientific Latin name as the common name, Cobalopsis Nero, while the Glassberg book calls it the “Nero Brown Skipper” as a common name.
Cobalopsis nero, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa RicaCobalopsis nero, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica
See all of my SKIPPERS Gallery to see some of the many variations in Skippers, 67 in my gallery alone and there are many more!
This one is almost as common in my garden as yesterday’s Banded Peacock, or it was last year especially when I seemed to see it everywhere! It is also common in the Southeastern U.S. west through OK & TX and south through Mexico and all of Central America with a slightly different species in South America. We also have more than 20 other species of Satyrs with color differences and uniqueness of those eye spots. They are mostly quite tiny, like only a bit bigger than my thumbnail, with of course a few exceptions! :-)
Or to explore more of the larger Satyr Sub-Family of butterflies scroll down to the bottom of my BRUSHFOOTS FAMILY GALLERYwhere I have 22 different species of Satyrs photographed! It’s quite an intriguing sub-family of mostly tiny butterflies, though a few are large, like the Moon Satyr, and all have variations of the eyespots seen on this one.
It took longer after this trip to put the gallery together with a lengthy flurry of activities and first of year requirements, but my Christmas Trip of 2023 December 22-28 — San Gerardo de Dota, Hotel Savegre is ready to visit with all my birds, other wildlife, flowers and landscapes ready to view!
That’s right! I’m back to sharing photos from my Christmas Trip to Hotel Savegre in San Gerardo de Dota. I think I shared some shots of the grounds and a “broad look at the gardens” which are some of the best of any hotel in Costa Rica. Well now that I’m not as super-busy as I have been since Christmas, I’m going to finish the gallery for the Christmas Trip to Hotel Savegre! And this posts introduces the sub-gallery called: Savegre Individual Flowers where I just deposited 57 photos of individual flowers! And here is one of my favorite . . .
Dancing Dolls or Fuchsia at Hotel Savegre, San Gerardo de Dota, Costa Rica. CLICK IMAGE for more!
Just one photo that is linked to my Trip Gallery Grounds & Gardens Sub-Gallery with more photos and then in a few days I will share some really beautiful flowers, but this week has become overwhelming and I will be a few days later processing my flower photos with a guest from Canada here, medical lab work tomorrow at the National Hospital de Geriatria in San Jose, a trip to a new nature reserve for me Thursday with my Canadian friend and removing all my stuff from the Galería on Saturday. A really full week! But I see tranquility in next week! :-)
Just one corner of many gardens! CLICK IMAGE for more photos.
I’ve completed one more chunk of my Christmas Trip Gallery, the BIRDS Gallery with 20 species and some of my better bird photos including 5 species of Hummingbirds! You can click the gallery first page image below this one bird photo or just go to this web address: https://charliedoggett.smugmug.com/TRIPS/2023-December-22-28-San-Gerardo-de-Dota/BIRDS
Talamanca Hummingbird, San Gerardo de Dota, Costa Rica. Indigenous to Costa Rica!1st 6 of 21 galleries! CLICK this image for my Christmas Trip BIRD GALLERIES.
For locals in Atenas:
This is my last week (Jan. 8-13) in the Gallería Artenas! (At Plaza Calle 2 next to Linea Vital.) So if interested in any of my photos there or the Floral Accent Pillows, this week is your last opportunity to shop for them in person, in town, except the Photo Greeting Cards which starting next Sunday, January 14, will be available at Hotel Colinas del Sol, with everything else available only online through my Gallery, – – – Bookstore, or – – – CafePress Shop.
From now on I will consider my nature photography as my funand for this daily blog post, with any online sales and the Colinas del Sol greeting cards as “incidentals” to my fun hobby! No more gallerías, arts & crafts shows or physical selling for me! (Which, by the way, has always been tiring and at a financial loss for me.) Now I photograph only for fun! :-)
To me, every bird is a work of art and thus I try to make each photo of one a work of art, though I do have some ugly photos just to document seeing a species! :-) This common Rufous-collared Sparrow was seen a lot at Hotel Savegre this trip and I have a trip gallery of Rufous-collared Sparrows that will soon become a part of the Trip Gallery for this 2023 time at Savegre. And of course in my big birds gallery there’s a larger Rufous-collared Sparrow GALLERY with birds from this and other mountain lodges and even one at a hotel in San Jose and it includes my very first photo of this species from my 2009 trip to this same hotel (then a smaller mountain lodge) which is interesting, of a mother feeding her chick a worm, if you don’t consider that gross! :-) And you can read about this tropical bird on eBird. It is found only in Central and South America. The scientific name is Zonotrichia capensis.
A mature or older adult Rufous-collared Sparrow while the feature photo is of a younger bird, Hotel Savegre, San Gerardo de Dota, Costa Rica.
With 6 species, it is not my highest yield lodge for butterflies, but I did get 3 new species! They are: Lotus Ruby-eye – Perichares lotus, the Tailed Sulphur – Phoebis neocypris AND the Zabulon Skipper – Poanes zabulon with the other 3 repeats for me and mostly more colorful! :-) For the first time I got a Monarch and the Monarch Caterpillar on the same bush! That caterpillar is not shown here because I categorized him with “Other Wildlife.” :-) Here’s one photo of each of the 6 species presented alphabetically or you can see more in my developing Trip Gallery, Butterfly Sub-Gallery. Here’s one pix each of the 6 species seen:
I am immensely grateful for each and every one of you who read my blog regularly, occasionally or just look at the photos! My site host reports more that 2,000+ “hits” online at my website/blog every month! 🙂 And that doesn’t count many of the 500+ subscribers who only look at the email version nor most of the 650 Facebook Friends who look at the one feature photo without clicking the the link to the post!
I also appreciate the hundreds of comments left on the posts monthly and many “contacts” or messages through my contact page or by email. Just yesterday I responded to a man in England with questions about photographing wildlife at Esquinas Rainforest Lodge and a friend in the States commented with a meaningful Bible verse about my post yesterday on hugging the 800 year old tree. Nature is fun! :-) And you who read or just look at the pictures are the ones who make it fun for me! :-) THANKS! Keep reading or looking at the pix! And click the gallery links for more pix!
As usual, I’m ending the year with 12 photos from this year, equaling one per month but not literally from each month, since some months have weaker or fewer photos. Nor are these necessarily my top 12 favorite photos from this year, but are representative 2023 photos from “Retired in Costa Rica” this year, with birds and butterflies obviously being two favorite subjects again! :-) One shot here for the email version and eleven more online with a quick click below of “Read More”!
