Wednesday, February 20, 2008, 8:15 pm
Bienvenido a Costa Rica
MORAVIA, COSTA RICA — I arrived in Costa Rica on Monday. It’s my first time here. I’ve been staying in a suburb of San José, which isn’t particularly bird-rich. Some of the city birds are common in Texas (e.g., Great-tailed Grackles and White-winged Doves), others reach the northernmost limit of their distribution in southern Texas (e.g., Red-billed Pigeon and Clay-colored Thrush (Robin)). There are Central American specialties too of course, like Rufous-collared Sparrow, and….
This is a Blue-crowned Motmot (Motmotus motmota). Wow! That blue gleams with a breathtaking brilliance. The bird’s racket-shaped central tail feathers are obscured in this photo, unfortunately.
Today we visited the gardens at Hotel Bougainvillea — crammed with spectacular flowers and other plants. There were birds around too, including North American refugees like Yellow Warbler and Summer Tanager, and some Central American birds I haven’t had time to look up yet.
David J. Ringer
on 21 Feb 2008 at 8:12 am 1.Greg said …
Great to hear from you again! Nathan and I had our last Costa Rican lifer at Hotel Bougainvillea. Prevost’s Ground-Sparrow. This hotel was our last stop before heading back to the states last summer.
Birdstack is awesome! Great job!
on 21 Feb 2008 at 9:27 am 2.Patrick said …
I too got my Prevost’s Ground Sparrow there too. The grounds there are not half-bad as a starting point. We had calling Ferruginous Pygmy-Owls there too when I was there in 2005. Man, I miss CR… I’m off to Guatemala in a week though so I’ll get some tropical birding in myself!
on 22 Feb 2008 at 6:43 pm 3.Old Horsetail Snake said …
Aw, you are so fortunate. Costa Rica has got to be one of the birdiest places on the planet.
on 03 Apr 2008 at 7:33 pm 4.manelson said …
I love your Blue Crowned Motmot photograph. I saw many of them on my trip to Panama in the canal zone area. They let me get pretty close so I was able to get some decent pictures. Thanks so much for developing your Birdstack site. It fits all of my requirements and I really like how I can show my recent observations on my blog. Take care.