COSTA RICA - DAY 10 - FEBRUARY 17TH 2014

SAVEGRE HOTEL de MONTAǸE TRAILS - ALL DAY

BALTIMORE ORIOLE

It was a much quieter day and a little anticlimactic after yesterday’s fantastic birding extravaganza. After a lovely breakfast at 6:30am we loaded up into two four wheel drive land rovers and were taken up some 300 meters to the top of mountain behind the hotel. It was a lovely bright sunny day with little cloud and we were sheltered from any wind by the mountain.

COMMON BUSH-TANAGER

It started slow then we had a couple of purple patches then it went slow again for a while. We walked back down along the main track before turning off onto one the well maintained walks, we choose the Quebrada Trail.

We found the Collared Redstart to be quite common and the Wilson’s Warbler, also most of the small flocks qe found were of Common Bush-Finches which lived up to their name. A sighting of a male Black-throated Green Warbler was our first new species, a couple of Mountain Eleanias and Yellowish Flycatchers were nice to see also an Ochraceous Peewee showed well.
 

Our first feeding flock held several species, the beautiful Spangled'-cheeked Tanager was the most common of the tanagers and were often joined by Silvery-throated Tanagers. This first flock had 4 or 5 Ruddy Treerunners, a Spotted Barbtail and a Barred Beard (we only heard this species). Yellow-thither Finches fed with the bush finches and a brief view was had of a what we thought was a Silver-throated Jay.

SUMMER TANAGER

A Golden-browed Chlorophonia called but we never located it but we did tracked down a Resplendent Quetzal from its call. A Silvery-fronted Tapaculo refused to show but we found our one and only Green-fronted Lancebill and what a bill it has! The next few hundred metres went quiet and only few sightings were made, a Chestnut-capped Brush-Finch showed for a few of us and not much else happened.

FLAME-COLOURED TANAGER

Lunch was taken back at the hotel and we reconvened  at 3:30pm outside the main reception office. We set off on foot taking a track through the woods to an open grassy area, there we found several species including: Summer Tanager, Yellow-winged Vireo and Brown-Capped Vireo. We also had good views of a Black-throated Green Warbler and the beautiful Spangle-cheeked Tanager, a Dark Pewee and a Tufted Flycatcher were nice to see too.

We walked down to the river and hit a purple patch when we found a pair of the endemic Flame-throated Warblers, what a stunning looking species. We had excellent views of yet another male Resplendent Quetzal, this bird is almost common around here. Next we found a Ruddy-capped Nightingale Thrush, a Gray-breasted Wren and a little later we found another target species a Spot-crowned Woodcreeper. We walked back to the hotel via the river and found  a Louisiana Waterthrush feeding in the river. Back at the hotel we watched the last of the activity at the feeders wirh Flame-coloured Tanagers and Acorn Woodpeckers making an appearance.

Well that concluded another great day in Costa Rica, tomorrow will be on the move to the Pacific Slopes at a much lower altitude.