This Palm Tanager seems to be contemplating the row of palms behind my Cecropia Tree and when he flies in them, I can no longer photograph him as he hides between the fronds. 🙂
See more in my Palm Tanager GALLERY.
¡Pura Vida!
Palm Contemplation
Orchard Oriole
Less common here than the Baltimore Oriole, this male is different from the Baltimore with his richer “chestnut” or dark orange (rust) color and a tiny curvature on his bill plus being a little smaller than the Baltimore Oriole. This was a difficult call for me because it is rarer here, though Merlin backs me up on calling it an Orchard, having run both of these photos through that A-I bird identification program on my cell phone. It is a lifer for me, Orchard Oriole, Icterus spurius, linked to the eBird description. And if you would like to compare with the Baltimore Oriole, see that link to my gallery on them where you will see that the male is a brighter yellow-orange and even part yellow. Both species summer in North America and winter in Central and northern South America starting in October. As you can see in the above gallery link, I’ve seen a lot more of the Baltimore here than the Orchard! My first today! Just these two shots from my Cecropia Tree this morning:
For more photos of this bird this morning, see my Orchard Oriole GALLERY, though my two favorite shots are here! 🙂
¡Pura Vida!
Persistent Flower!
Anthuriums have almost always done well in my garden and even better in a big pot on my terrace where they get sun about 80% of the day. They grow in one shady part of my garden with almost no sun, but not as well and with smaller & fewer flowers. But this week I observed this “stray” among my taller plants that get 60+% sunshine, mostly midday. I did not plant the anthurium there where the taller plants get all of the sun, but look what this flower did that somehow got planted among the tall ones! It sent the flower stem up through the tall plants to a height of 5 ft 3 inches, that’s 63 inches or 160 centimeters! It’s the first time I’ve seen an anthurium shoot up that high! It is obviously one strong and persistent flower! 🙂
See the ones in a pot with about 80% sun and another in almost total shade. They all seem to do well, but the above one shows that sunshine is important to any flower, even one that grows in the shade. 🙂
Continue reading “Persistent Flower!”Today’s Lone Butterfly
This morning’s walk through the garden revealed only one butterfly, but a favorite! 🙂 The Rounded Metalmark, Caliphelis perditalis, (linked to my other gallery shots), a tiny butterfly in the Riodinidae or Metalmark family of butterflies about the size of two of my thumbnails. I love the rich blend of blue, orange and brown colors and in my gallery you can see some shots of his “cute” bug-eyed face! 🙂 Surprisingly, the only place I’ve seen this species so far is in my garden here in Atenas. 🙂
And yes, butterflies seem to be fading (moving or dying off) a little earlier this year than usual. I will be interested to see if there are more in the “wilder” forest preserve I will visit next week at Macaw Lodge adjacent to Carara National Park. And hopefully more birds there too! 🙂
¡Pura Vida!
And an interesting announcement in our online English-language newspaper, Tico Times, this week: Travel & Leisure Magazine Named Costa Rica the 2024 Destination of the Year!
Or better yet, go directly to the Travel+Leisure articles on Costa Rica!
¡Pura Vida!
Morning Coffee & Wildlife
Friends up the hill invited me for coffee on their terrace yesterday where they have both a hummingbird feeder and a fruit feeder to attract more birds. And though they too have had fewer birds this year of El Niño weather, they get more than me because of their feeders and maybe their location adjacent the Calle Nueva Forest. Here’s what I was able to photograph while drinking coffee and talking a lot, though the one hummingbird never slowed down enough for a shot. 🙂
4 birds, 2 insects and one iguana . . .
Continue reading “Morning Coffee & Wildlife”Dorantes Longtails in 2 Colors
And I do not know why some are dark brown and others are a light tan, but they are and these two were together. Maybe one color is male and one female. I don’t know! Dorantes Longtail, Urbanus dorantes.
¡Pura Vida!
Air Plant just appeared . . .
. . . in one of my Nance trees and of all things, on a dead limb! The wind probably blew the baby plant there when it broke off its mother plant in maybe another tree or higher up in this same tree. And the dead limb is no problem because it does not get its nourishment from the tree but from the air! Here’s a good short definition from the Family Handyman site with more info at that link . . .
“Air plants, or Tillandsia, grow floating in the air, where they live and thrive without soil.
familyhandyman.com
Part of the Bromeliad family, air plants are epiphytes — plants that attach themselves to other plants for support, without relying on the host to thrive.”
It feeds from the air with its arms while the roots are only used to hold on to it base, a tree limb in this case. This one is a recent or young plant only the size of a human hand, but will likely grow larger.
There are more wild air plant photos scattered throughout my Flora & Forest GALLERY. 🙂
¡Pura Vida!
Melodious Blackbird
This all black bird can be found on both slopes of Costa Rica and in some areas is quite common. He is the only totally black bird in Costa Rica with even his bill and eyes being black. Read about him on eBird or see more of my photos (better ones) in the Melodious Blackbird Gallery.
¡Pura Vida!
Hoffmann’s Woodpecker
Though Black-cheeked Woodpecker seems to be more common around Atenas for me, this species may be the second most common woodpecker, at least in my garden. 🙂
See my Hoffmann’s Woodpecker Gallery
or read about on eBird.
¡Pura Vida!
And for Halloween see this Tico Times article with video of Spooky Creatures Inhabit Costa Rica’s Jungles.
Walk to Clinic Flowers
The other day I needed to walk to our Atenas public Clinic to pick up a “cita” or appointment to see an audiometrics doctor in the Alajuela Hospital for what will probably end up being a government-provided hearing aid for my left ear that I can hardly hear with since the big cancer surgery. They require that piece of paper for the visit but send it to our local clinic to pick up so I can avoid another trip to Alajuela. 🙂
I make that 12 block walk frequently for multiple reasons (my GP doctor, pharmacy, lab, etc.), but on this particular trip I decided to see if I could photograph some contrasting or different flowers with my cellphone and that was after I had already passed the Zinnas. 🙂 Here’s four totally different flowers in various yards over that 12 block walk:
