Birding the Hotel Grounds – San Miguel Reservoir – Fredo Fresha Hummingbird Gardens (Poasito) – Bougainvillea Hotel Gardens
WEATHER; clear blue sky to start, very windy. Later as we gained height we had cloud and rain. Top temp 26C
Some of us made an early start from our accommodation in La Garita, but we all met up at breakfast in the Aeropuerto Hotel. We had some time to find some birds in the garden before the bus arrived with our guide, and that is exactly what we did.
Black Vulture taken by Kevin Jones - a very common bird always in the sky
It was very windy which kept most species down, but we did find a few. The very common cLay-colored Thrush, Rufous-backed Wren (changed from Rufous-naped Wren), Baltimore Oriole, Yellow Warbler, Tennessee Warbler, Great Kiskadee, Blue-and-Gray Tanager, Lineated and Hoffman’s Woodpeckers, Plain-capped Starthroat, Rufous-tailed Hummingbird, Turkey and Black Vultures, Blue-and-white Swallows and a few butterflies.
Blue-gray Tanager taken by Kevin Jones
At 9am our bus arrived with Jason, our guide, onboard, we were all set, the luggage was loaded, and off we went. Our first destination was the large San Miguel Reservoir (no, it wasn’t full of lager!) the sat nav said 20 minutes but it took over an hour because of the horrendous traffic around San Jose.
on nthe bus top our first destination
It was quite hot when we arrived but the windy conditions helped to keep us cool. Scanning the water we found several species in a relatively quick time. Blue-winged Teal, Lesser Scaup, Least Grebe, genuine Muscovy Ducks, Southern Lapwing, Spotted Sandpiper, Snowy Egret, Little Blue Heron, Cattle Egret, Northern Jacana and a couple of the group saw a Purple Gallinule.
at the roadside next to the San Miguel Reservoir
Jason then concentrated on the many birds dashing about in the mature trees above and on a bank across the busy and noisy road. He called out many species, I can’t list them all but a few stand out in my memory: Streak-headed Woodcreeper, Nutting’s Flycatcher, Social Flycatcher, Boat-billed Flycatcher, Masked Tityra, Blue-black Grassquit, Stripe-headed Sparrow. Most of these species are expected to be found in this dry-forest environment.
Blue-winged Teal - another Kevin Jones picture
It was approaching lunchtime when we pulled away from there, we drove upwards toward the Poas Mountain area and headed to a well known Hummingbird Garden in Poasito, Unfortunately for us we drove into low cloud and drizzling rain, so we headed into a restaurant for lunch.
female Masked Tityra
The rain never stopped during our visit, it only varied in intensity, but most of us had a waterproof coat to hand. We never saw many species at all, it was quite bleak there and such a shame. All the hummingbird feeders had been removed, so we watched certain flowering plants. We ended seeing four species of hummers. The Magenta-throat Woodstar was by far the gem of hummers, we did see Lesser Violetear, Talamanca and Rufous-tailed Hummingbirds.
Streak-headed Woodcreeper
The rain drove us off after a woodland walk down into steep ravine. We saw very little down there too! Jason heard a White-breasted Wood-Wren and we all heard the call of the Lesser Violetear, but mostly we saw nothing.
Turquoise-browed Motmot
It was late afternoon when we arrived at the Bougainvillea Hotel we hadn’t planned an official walk but most of the group went out into the extensive gardens for ther last hour or so of daylight.
Red-billed Pigeon taken by Kev Jones
Nearly everyone in the group got to see the star of the show, the Mottled Owl! A pair of these elusive owls have been in residence in the gardens, in a huge clump of Bamboo for the last 4 years.
The Rufous Collared Sparrow went down well, but generally there wasn’t that much activity. A group of Crimson-fronted Parakeets flew over as did a Yellow-headed Caracara. Small flocks of Red-billed Pigeons gathered in the taller trees, a Melodious Blackbird delivered its tuneful song right outside my room.
Our birdlog revealed that we had seen over 60 species today, which wasn't a bad effort in the poor weather conditions,