BIRDING THE LOCAL AREA INCLUDING QUALITALES LODGE - DRIVE TO SAN JOSE AIRPORT
WEATHER: clear sky to start, cloudy later with broken sunshine. Top temp 25C
This was the final day of the tour and we only had a few hours in the early morning to find a few special species missing from our list. The Sunbittern was by far the most wanted and luckily for us Jason knew where to find one.
We met at 5:45am and drove in the bus to Qualitales Lodge where a pair of the Sunbitterns were building a nest next to a large garden pool. We were very lucky because on arrival both birds were vsiible, they eventually flew up to their nest and promptly, (and on time acording to the owner of the lodge), began to mate. This process involved the male spreading his wings so we could photograph the amazing and colourful wing feathers from where the birds gets its name.
the Sunbittern taking off and showing its wonderful wing feathers - taken by Brian fairbrother
here is the male Sunbittern calling to the female
Wow! That was truly amazing, it had the group buzzing, it was a star bird to finish the trip with, whoopie!
We then walked up to the waterfall at the top of the lodge's grounds, up there is a series of bushes selected to attarct hummers, and a few feeders that also attracted several hummingbird species. Two of which were nationally rare and exclusive to a small area of cloud forest. The Black-bellied Hummingbird and the White-bellied Mountain-Gem are two small species and csn be seen in this garden.
the beautiful Violet Sabrewing - another picture by Brian Fairbrother
We found Green-crowned Brilliant , Green Hermit, Violet Sabrewing, Rufous-tailed Hummingbird and a few us saw the White-bellied Mountain-Gem.
The Green Hermit taken by Brian Fairbrother
The Black-bellied hummer and the Green-fronted Lancebill did not show up. However we did see White-eared Ground-Sparrow a couple of times and a new bird for our list was the Chestnut-capped Brus-Finch.
Chestnut-capped Brush-Finch captured by Brian Fairbrother
Beofre long we were rounded up and marched down to the bus, time was of the essence, however, we did make one more stop as we headed back to our hotel. We stopped just past a river and we walked back to view the fast flowing water from a narrow bridge. Jason, almost immediately found our taget species! The Fasciated Tiger Heron is not easy to find and not that common, it does like fast flowing rivers such as the one we were watching, another great find for our list.
Fasciated Tiger-Heron taken by Kevin Jones
We made it back to breakfast before 9am and by 9:45 we were all packed up and on the road to San Jose. 10 of us were dropped off at the Hotel Aeropuerto and Brian went to another hotel. Most of our flights were scheduled for tomorrow, so we had plenty of time to bird-watch in the gardens.
Lake Cachi seen as the floating weed mass starts to break up exposing the surface of the water
We found a good number species in a fruiting avocado tree, Summer, Blue-and-Gray, Scarlet-Rumped and Palm Tanagers, Rose-breasted Grosbeak, Buff-throated Saltator, Lineated and Hoffman's Woodpeckers and the ubiquitous Clay-colored Thrush and the Rufous-backed Wren. A Turquoise-browed Mot-Mot was a nice find too!
the driveway to the Aeropuerto Hotel
In the meantime, Brian, at a neighbouring hotel discovered a Ferruginous Pygmy Owl in the grounds of his hotel.
Ferruginous Pygmy Owl taken by Brian Fairbrother
A late afternoon walk in our gardens produced more sightings: Tennessee Warbler, Yellow Warbler, Squirrel Cuckoo and a lot of coomon species.
the beautiful male Summer Tanager
another shot of the Sunbitterns at their nest in the tree
Most of us met for a final meal together at 7pm, Paul and Mike had already gone to the airport. We had a nice time for a couple of hours before heading off to bed. Kevin, Rachel and Rob were catching a very early flight and the remaing 5 of us were taking an afternoon flight. The trip was now officially over.
Apart from the first few days of rain it had been a wonderful trip, we saw most of the target species and enjoyed some fascinating birding. We saw 400 species of over 25 mammals and countless butterflies.
If you have enjoyed reading about thsi great trip To Costa Rica, why not join us on our 2027 Tour?