Lesson's Motmot Archives - Retired in Costa Rica

Walking to the supermarket Monday morning I crossed one of these “seasonal streams” or THE NASTY PLACE, a storm sewer creek where unfortunately some locals dump their “gray water” (sink & bath/shower water) which is always whitish from the soap, especially with the hand-washing emphasis these days. 🙂 There is no public sewage in little Atenas with everyone’s toilets going into their private septic tanks that work better without the abundance of “gray water.” Houses like mine have the gray water going into a “root-system-looking” group of pipes deep into the ground where the water goes through holes in the pipes and soaks down through dirt and rock purifying it before it gets to the underground aquifers, from which come our well-water or drinking water. 🙂 TMI?

As I crossed over the “bridge” (street over a concrete culvert or pipe) where the city is bulldozing to widen the road or bridge at that point (extend the concrete pipe), I see a Lesson’s Motmot, THE PRETTY BIRD, fly up from the stream to a tree and I quickly grab my cellphone for a photo at quite a distance and thus the herewith BAD PHOTOS! Yes, I know that I could carry my big camera with me everywhere I go, but just don’t find that very comfortable or convenient (especially in the supermarket) and settle for what I can get with the cellphone camera. And it is okay for buildings, people, or even flowers which let me get closer than the bird will! 🙂

Anyway – that’s my story! And I’m sticking with it! And I apologize if you find the part about “gray water” objectionable! 🙂 ¡Así es la vida! That’s life!

20200525_101316_001-A-WEB — Look closely in upper left corner for the Motmot on a dead tree limb.

20200525_101328_002-A-WEB — Just consider this “cellphone pixelation art.” 🙂

¡Pura Vida!

I have not been having many interesting or colorful birds at breakfast for awhile, with many rufous-naped wrens & clay-colored thrush! And it seems like maybe a year since I’ve seen one of the Blue-crowned Motmots now renamed to be Lesson’s Motmot (wish they wouldn’t do that!). But yesterday at breakfast, early for me, about 6:20-6:30 I had a motmot visit. This one Lesson’s Motmot flew into the Nance Tree looking for Nance Berries I assume, staying there 3 or 4 minutes, occasionally flying to the ground and briefly foraging, maybe for fallen berries or an insect. Then he was gone. If I spent more time on my terrace I would undoubtedly see more birds! i.e. Two different neighbors have seen Crested Caracaras in the cow pasture in front of my house and I haven’t. Too much time on my computer?! 🙂 Well, I focus more on birds on my monthly trip and that is when I photograph the most. But it is nice to know that I still have a large variety of birds near my house!

Note that this one has both pendants on the end of his tail which is almost unusual now as most seem to catch then on a tree or something and tear one or both off as you can see in my gallery.

See some of my other Lesson’s Motmots photos (better photos!) as a sub gallery of my bigger Costa Rica Birds Gallery where you can find other sub galleries for 3 other types of motmots:

Rufous Motmot (more on Caribbean side)
Broad-billed Motmot (more on Caribbean side)
Turquoise-browed Motmot ( in north, more common in Nicaragua)

These 3 can be seen in the right parts of Costa Rica, though the Lesson’s is most common and most widely distributed and favors the Pacific side of CR.