MORNING SESSION IN THE HOTEL CAR PARK – ALL MORNING WALK AT SAVEGRE LODGE TRAILS – LUNCH AT MIRIAM’S CAFÉ AND BIRD FEEDER PLATFORM – LATE AFTERNOON WALK TO THE RIVER
WEATHER: a bright start with broken sunshine and no wind. Cloudy later with some light rain. Temp 17C
Our planned walk around the grounds of the hotel did not materialise because when we met in the main car park at 6am we saw so many birds that we did not budge! Hummers were very busy visiting the flowering plants all around us. Some great names rolled of the tongue of Jason our guide. Scintillant, Volcano, Talamanca, Violetear and White-throated Mountain-Gem are all hummingbirds, we saw all five, together with Slaty Flowerpiercer, in the flowers.
A Talamanca Hummingbird by kevin Jones
Above them in the bushes we found Flame-colored Tanager, what a beauty! Long-tailed Silky Flycatchers, a pair of them were building a nest. A real goodie was the endemic Dark Pewee, it is a black flycatcher, and it showed well. Most other species we had seen before but with much better views, the hour soon passed and breakfast time soon arrived.
Long-tailed Silky Flycatcher by Kevin
Most of day was then spent at the fabulous Savegre Lodge Birding trails, we drove there in the bus and transferred to jeeps at reception but not before some birding around the lodge. We had very close views of Long-tailed Silky Flycatchers and several hummers were visiting the feeders.
a Volcano Hummingbird taken by Kevin Jones
The jeeps took us to the top of the mountain and we spent 4 hours walking down, where the jeeps left was a viewing platform with stunning views over the San Gerardo Valley. The birdlife in the canopy below us was terrific, we had a real warbler fest! The bright yellow Wislon’s Warbler stood out in the greenery and two species of black and yellow warblers appeared too. We saw Townsend’s and Black-throated Green Warblers, both were stunning males as was the Black-and-white Warbler. Tennessee Warblers joined in too with superb Flame-throated Warbler, what a stunner.
Flame-throated Warbler
Above us a flock of some 48 Broad-winged Hawks drifted over the valley, a migrating group. We finished with an exciting find of a Rufous-browned Pepper-shrike, this bird had eluded us thus far, but was now firmly in the bag.
Rufous-browed Pepper-shrike
Our walk started and stopped many times, it was the best forest walk of the trip by far, birds appeared in mixed flocks or individually and we lapped them up. The beautiful Collared Redstart got the cameras clicking, a family party of Flame-throated Warblers did the same.
Collared Redstart taken by Kevin
We bumped into many birds, Jason worked hard finding them and our four hours disappeared in a flash! Here some of the birds we came across; Hairy and Acorn Woodpeckers, Ruddy Treerunners, Ochraceous Wren and Grey-breasted Wood-Wren, Black-faced Solitaire. Flycatchers were everywhere. Black-capped, Tufted, Yellowish, Olive-streaked and Mountain Elaenia.
Black-faced Solitaire
Black-cheeked Warbler was a nice find, we heard the Silvery-throated Tapaculo but it never showed. When we broke out of the forest back onto the main track it began to rain, we still had a kilometer to walk downhill and we kept bumping into birds. Yellow-winged, Brown-capped and Philadelphia Vireos fed with warbler flocks, we found Large-footed Finch, Yellow-thighed Brushfinch, Sooty-capped Chlorospingus, Yellow-bellied Siskin, Sulphur-winged Parakeets, Blue-and-white Swallows dashed above us.
Yellow-thighed Brushfinch, you can just see the yellow thigs! taken by Kevin
We finished back at the reception, it was 1pm and we were an hour late for our booked-lunch at a restaurant which was a twenty minute drive away. At the restaurant there were very busy bird feeders, we saw many species very close up, nothing new for the list but great views of them. A Golden-browed Chlorophonia was an exciting find there and getting very close up views of tanagers, hummers, woodpeckers, thrushes and warblers was exciting.
Acorn Woodpecker taken by Kevin
It was 3pm when we got back to our hotel and 4pm we went back out for a short walk down to the river. Our target bird was the American Dipper of which we saw two, also Torrent Tyrannulet, Louisianna Waterthrush, Slate-throated Redstart and the Stripe-tailed Hummingbird which was new for our hummers list and was our 30th species of hummer for the trip!
Tufted Flycatcher taken by Kevin
Golden-browed Chlorophonia by Kevin
afeeder action shot taken by Kevin at Miriam's Cafe
We ate dinner at 6:30pm and everyone took an early night, it had been a tiring day with a lot of walking.