As the winter chill wears off, many of us are anticipating how we can spiff up our yards. That can be a tall order when we’ve inherited a landscape of sterile lawns and imported ornamental plants that have no business growing in Montana—or, most likely, wherever else you happen to live. Fortunately, this situation presents us with a wonderful opportunity to bolster the native ecosystems we know and love. How? By replacing exotic species with native plants that are both beautiful and provide real value to birds, insects, and other native wildlife.
Our blue penstemon and other flowering plants feed a host of native insects, including a variety of bumblebees.
A Scientific American article titled “The American Obsession with Lawns,” points out that lawns began sprouting up in America in the nineteenth century. They were an attempt to emulate trendier Europeans and, more important, to display wealth and status. Fast forward to today, and a house doesn’t seem complete without its neatly-mowed spread of Kentucky bluegrass. Unfortunately, our obsession with lawns comes with a host of problems.
As you can see, we aren’t purists. Here, native mock orange (white flowers), snowberry, and fireweed thrive amid California poppies and some kind of honeysuckle I can’t recall the name of!
Especially in the West, lawns gobble up water that we can scarcely afford. Just how much depends on location and other factors, but keeping a lawn alive can devour between 15 and 75% of a family’s household water consumption. Keeping those lawns green and pristine-looking also can be expensive, especially factoring in the gas and electricity required to run lawnmowers, and the fertilizers and herbicides to keep lawns green and weed-free. Speaking of “weed-free,” despite industry claims that herbicides and other garden chemicals are safe, I am skeptical. Do you really want to be dumping things into the soil that may persist for decades and have unknown long-term health risks. I don’t—especially when my yard sits only twenty feet above the aquifer that I and the rest of my community depends on for drinking water.
Despite industry claims, I don’t think we’ll know the full impacts of a lot of chemicals for years. Unless we want to keep repeating chemical disasters, it seems prudent to avoid commercial herbicides and insecticides whenever possible. Replacing at least a bit of your lawn with native plants is a great way to do that.
All that said, my biggest beef with imported lawns and plants is that they have needlessly transformed productive habitat into sterile expanses with almost no useful function. Sure, a lawn is great for kids to play on—we keep a patch of it ourselves—but our grass obsessions have come at an extreme cost to wildlife, especially to native insects and birds. Many of you have probably heard the shocking statistics that America has lost one quarter of its breeding birds in the short space of fifty years. There are many causes for this, but habitat loss probably ranks at the top. While much of this loss may have been unavoidable, in the case of our lawns, it is not.
Even common, beloved birds have seen dramatic declines in the past fifty years, and habitat loss is often a culprit. Yards filled with native plants can be a major step in reversing this trend. (This is a newly-fledged Black-capped Chickadee sitting in one of our mock orange plants.)
Author Douglas Tallamy (Nature’s Best Hope) points out that 40 million acres of our nation’s natural habitats have been converted to turfgrass—an area about 42% the size of Montana! If we “turf owners” convert just half of our lawns to native habitat, it will restore an area larger than the Everglades, Yellowstone, Yosemite, Grand Teton, Canyonlands, Mount Rainier, North Cascades, Badlands, Olympic, Sequoia, Grand Canyon, Denali, and the Great Smoky Mountains National Parks. Talk about your game changer!
One great thing about native plants is that once you put a few in, they find where else they want to be. This patch of beebalm came up totally on its own—much to the delight of honey bees, bumblebees, and butterflies. (Golden currant in the background, angling up to the right.)
Fortunately, converting your yard to native plants is fairly easy to do. A simple online search reveals nurseries that offer native plants all over our state (also check your native plant society—see below). You don’t have to create your own “national park” all at once. Just dig up a strip of your present lawn and put in some native shrubs. Here in Montana, you’ll want to stick to deer-resistant plants such buffaloberry, juniper, or maple sumac—or better yet, protect plants with fencing until they grow large enough to thwart deer. Before planting trees, think about how big that tree is going to be in fifty or one hundred years—and plant it in an appropriate spot. If you live in a fire area, you’ll want to make sure you keep a defensible space around your house, too.
Native plants don’t just “grow” native insects. Many provide fruit and seeds for birds, as this berry-laden serviceberry branch shows.
Incorporating native plants into your yard brings immediate rewards. Our modest native plantings attract chickadees, juncos, wrens, kinglets, and other native birds, many of them feeding on the insects that the plants produce. Why not join the fun? You’ll discover a whole new aspect of gardening, and take satisfaction in helping the wildlife we hold dear.
This House Wren and its mate successfully raised a batch of youngsters in our yard last summer. At times, the pair were bringing caterpillars and other insects to their chicks every two or three minutes! To my satisfaction, I watched them grab most of these insects right off of the native plants in our yard!
Sneed’s Favorite Native Plants for the Yard That Don’t Need Deer Protection: buffaloberry, maple sumac, juniper, mountain mahogany, chocolate coneflower, yellow coneflower, Oregon grape, pussytoes.
Sneed’s Favorite Native Plants That Do Need Deer Protection (at least until they grow larger): golden currant, beebalm, burr oak, purple coneflower, mock orange, aspen, rabbitbrush, serviceberry, cottonwood (need a LARGE space).
A Word of Advice: Never, EVER plant any grasses unless you really know what you’re doing. Even native grasses can quickly get out of hand—as I have learned the hard way.
To find out sources of native plants and seeds, check the website of the Montana Native Plant Society. They have lists of resources for every part of the state! If you don’t live in Montana, you probably have your own native plant society you can look up! Here in Missoula, another great resource is Watershed Consulting, which has a wonderful native plant nursery. You can get their list via:
If you can’t find a good source of native plants near you, call up the wonderful Audubon native plant database. There you can just enter your zip code and begin finding the best plants to put in near you. Even better, you can purchase the plants directly from the website.
Braden and I write FatherSonBirding in the hopes of sharing the wonders of birds and birding, and the urgency to protect them. We do not accept advertising or donations, but if you’d like to support our work, please consider buying *NEW* copies of some of Sneed’s books—First-Time Japan, for instance, or my recent Orbis Pictus Award winner, Border Crossings. We appreciate your interest and hope you will keep reading!
When birding big cities I’ve discovered that it often requires a bit of extra effort to reach even a highly modified natural area. That proved true last year when my daughter and I visited Japan (see “Birding Japan: Kanazawa”), and it once again proved to be the case when my wife and I recently visited Barcelona. After birding city parks and tourist sites all week, I had barely breached 30 bird species total—far short of my goal of 50 or 60 species (see “Birding Barcelona, Part 1: The Urban Core”). I had a plan to help rectify the situation—but it was going to take that extra bit of effort to realize it.
On the last full day of our trip, I rose early, wolfed down some yoghurt, and hailed a cab in front of our hotel. In my mediocre Spanish, I explained to Isabella, my driver, where I wanted to go and even showed her the place on Google Maps. She knew about the area and had even been there, so we set out toward the airport in a light drizzle.
When visiting Barcelona, the best chance for a birder to enjoy some natural habitat—and an abundance of birds—is to take a taxi out to the Espais Naturals del Delta del Llobregat near the Barcelona Airport.
My destination was the “Espais Naturals del Delta del Llobregat,” which I’ll just call “Llobregat” for simplicity. Llobregat was a wetland divided into two parts, one on either side of the Barcelona airport, and the reason it existed at all was no doubt due to the fact that you can’t build huge buildings where giant aircraft can run into them. I thank the travel gods for that because these wetlands were the only orange-colored (high species count) hotspots anywhere near the city of Barcelona.
I asked Isabella to drop me off at the area on the far (western) side of the airport, and twenty minutes later found myself standing utterly alone on a road that appeared to lead into the natural area. Turns out, Isabella could have driven me another mile closer to the main action, but that error turned out to be a good thing. As I walked down the road, I began hearing all kinds of bird vocalizations and soon Merlin’s Sound ID picked up a new lifer for me, Cetti’s Warbler, calling from the thick reeds on both sides of the road. Sound ID also picked up Green Sandpiper, which got me really excited because shorebirds were at the top of my list to see on this, my sole real birding outing, of the trip. As I walked, I also saw what would be my only raptors of the trip—three Western Marsh-Harriers—and some high-flying swallow-type birds that turned out to be Eurasian Crag-Martins. I got occasional glimpses at a canal to my left, but saw only Mallards, a pair of Gadwalls, and a Gray Heron in it.
Half an hour later, I arrived at Llobregat’s official entrance and was relieved to see a series of established trails that led to various bird blinds around the reserve. As I followed the first trail, Common Chiffchaffs, Black Redstarts, European Robins, European Serins, and White Wagtails hopped and fluttered around me, but my excitement didn’t spike until I entered the first birding blind.
I had worried that I might miss Greater Flamingos in Spain, but a couple of dozen greeted me at Llobregat. Note how pale they are. Evidently, they are not getting enough crustaceans in their diets!
It took me about five seconds to locate the birds I most wanted to see—Greater Flamingos. But they just formed the tasty appetizer to the huge variety of waterfowl before me. This included many familiar ducks familiar from back home: Northern Shovelers, Gadwalls, Mallards, and the Eurasian variety of Green-winged Teal (which may eventually get split into a new species).
I just love the unique looks of Eurasia’s Green-winged Teals, which have a distinctively different appearance than our North American versions. I hope the taxonomic splitters pounce on them and declare them a distinct species.
The ducks that really got me going, though, were new for my life list: Common Shelducks and a pair of Red-crested Pochards that was doing its best to avoid eye contact on a distant island! I had hoped to see both of these, but had tempered my expectations. No worries—there they were, and in company of a lone Eurasian Wigeon.
Ka-ching! Life Bird #1007!Common Shelduck in the company of a pretty fetching Mallard!
As I sat enjoying the duck show, I also noted Eurasian Coots and Moorhens, along with a delightful pair of Little Grebes, all of which I had seen in Japan almost a year earlier. As I scanned the pond, I also saw something quickly dive into the reeds at the edge of the pond. I strongly suspect that this was a Water Rail, but reacted just a moment too slow to get my binoculars on it.
If you look at this photo carefully, you will see a number of charismatic Spanish species: Graylag Goose, Eurasian Wigeon, and my lifer Red-crested Pochards. The latter two are reported infrequently this time of year.
After about thirty minutes, I continued onto another viewing area. On the way, I passed a plywood wall with a few viewing windows cut into it and happened to take a quick peek. A largish purplish bird stuck out and my first thought was “Eurasian Moorhen.” Then, I did a double-take. “Hold on. Moorhens aren’t that blue—nor do they have bright red bills and legs!” The bird before me was one I had been studying on eBird quizzes, but darned if I could remember the name of it. Scrolling through eBird, I quickly found it: Western Swamphen! Even better, it had two adorable fuzzy black chicks with it!
I had not expected to see such a bird in my wildest dreams and it didn’t stay visible for long—just long enough for me to take a couple of modest photos—before disappearing into the reeds. And that, apparently, is typical for this bird, a species that rarely makes an appearance even where it might be fairly common. It immediately leaped to the top of my Trip Bird list, where it would remain for the rest of our vacation and beyond.
Earning Bird of the Trip honors, this rare sighting of a Western Swamphen put a lasting grin on my face. That black “shadow” to its left is actually one of two chicks accompanying it.
After more bird blind fun, I walked out to the beach in the hopes of seeing shorebirds. No dice. In fact, I didn’t see a single shorebird my entire morning, one of the trip’s big disappointments. I asked the interpreter about it and he confirmed that there hadn’t been many shorebirds around the entire year. Alas, I later discovered that the other section of the wetlands, on the east side of the airport, had been getting some. Nonetheless, I sat down on a jetty, breathed in the salt air of the Mediterranean, and enjoyed some bread and cheese while watching the giant jets taking off to almost every continent in the world. Then, I began making my way back down the long access road, happy with the day despite the shorebird miss.
My morning at Llobregat nabbed me 33 species—as many as I’d seen in the previous five days in Barcelona. It pushed my world life list to 1011 species. It also pushed my trip list to 49 species—one short of my goal of 50 species. “Shoot,” I thought, riding a taxi back downtown. “Where can I go near our hotel to pick up one more species?” I hadn’t a clue, and quietly resigned myself to this epic failure that would mar my reputation and confidence the rest of my life and cast shame upon my friends and family.
More Flamingo fun. These birds sat atop my list of birds I wanted to see in Barcelona and at Llobregat, they did not disappoint.
That evening, Amy—who had spent the day shopping and visiting the Picasso Museum—and I decided to take a walk before our last Barcelona supper. She hadn’t yet visited Parc de la Ciutadella (see my previous post “Birding Barcelona, Part 1: The Urban Core”), so we strolled over there. We reached the pond where they rented rowboats and decided to go for it. I handed over six Euros and we climbed in, joining a huge assortment of merry locals and tourists. Black-headed and Yellow-legged Gulls, Graylag Geese, Gray Herons, and Mallards surrounded us. Monk and Rose-ringed Parakeets squawked overhead. I smiled. This was a perfect way to wrap up the trip.
Then, I spotted a small bird sally out from the edge of the pond and return to land on a rock. From similar sightings in Taiwan, Israel, and Japan, I knew immediately what it was. “Gray Wagtail!” I exclaimed! Just as in Japan, it was the only GRWA I had seen, and it pushed my trip list to 50 species.
I swear, you can’t make this guano up.
Ciutadella’s popular rowing pond—and site of the trip’s sole Gray Wagtail.
Braden and I write FatherSonBirding in the hopes of sharing the wonders of birds and birding, and the urgency to protect them. We do not accept advertising or donations, but if you’d like to support our work, please consider buying *NEW* copies of some of Sneed’s books—First-Time Japan, for instance, or my recent Orbis Pictus Award winner, Border Crossings. We appreciate your interest and hope you will keep reading!
Since Braden and I started FatherSonBirding in 2018, I’ve posted a lot about birding in the company of Braden (of course) and my daughter, Tessa. You parents, though, may recognize that with growing kids at home it can be difficult to get one-on-one time with your actual spouse. Last week, Amy and I began to rectify this situation with our first couples vacation in seven years. Our destination was a place we had dreamed of visiting for more than a decade—Barcelona, Spain.
It’s no accident that I booked a hotel near what may be Barcelona’s largest urban parks.
I admit that Barcelona did not draw me for its birding opportunities. The promise of stunning architecture, great tapas, and practicing my Spanish, though, outweighed any potential avian shortcomings. Nonetheless, it will come as no surprise that I felt determined to scour this remarkable European city for every bird possible. I set a goal of 50 or 60 species for the week. Even more intriguing, my life list stood at 999 species. “Which bird will put me over the top?” I wondered.
I booked us in the Park Hotel, an awesome little place in the historic El Born neighborhood near the Barceloneta Metro Station, the Estacio de Franca train station, the waterfront, and hundreds of uber cool restaurants and shops. I did not admit to Amy that I also booked the place because it sat only a block from one of the city’s largest urban parks, Parc de la Ciutadella. As soon as our plane landed, we bought 5-day Metro passes and rode the subway into town. Emerging from Barceloneta Station, I immediately saw both Rose-ringed and Monk Parakeets noisily flying overhead—and then I spotted a black bird atop a light post. I recognized it right away as my bird #1,000—a Spotless Starling!
Bird 1000! A Spotless Starling! Under FatherSonBirding Rules of Full Disclosure, I am still waiting for someone to tell me that this is actually a European Starling. Apparently, they sometimes also take on this “all black” appearance. If that does turn out to be the case, Yellow-legged Gull will assume Bird #1000 honors!
It wasn’t until the next morning, though, that I seriously plunged into Barcelona birding by rising early and heading over to Ciutadella. It was a glorious, crisp morning and even before I reached the park gates, I noted a procession of parakeets, gulls, magpies, and Western Cattle Egrets flying toward the park. Like many urban parks, Ciutadella has a rather down-trodden, worked-over feel to it. Leaves have been obsessively raked, precluding the development of healthy soil layers (and the insect prey they could produce), and very little mid-sized vegetation exists. Still, I set out optimistically and almost immediately encountered Great Tits, a Eurasian Blue Tit, a European Robin, and my lifer European Serin.
Though I never got a great photo of one, Merlin’s Sound ID picked up European Serins in multiple places I birded. I worried I wouldn’t be able to recognize these as a number of yellowish, stripy, finchy birds live in Catalonia.
Wandering haphazardly, I quickly discovered that the park was the Monk Parakeet capital of Barcelona. Not only did this introduced South American species seem to love roosting and nesting in the palms, many people actually enjoyed feeding them, even early in the morning. This included several people who had pitched their tents in the park and evidently lived there (the tents had been cleared out by the end of the week—perhaps in preparation for a giant convention that was about to descend on the city).
Aaaaaaw! Monk Parakeets in love. Or at least sharing food. Or perhaps trying to peck each other’s eyes out.
I kept picking up birds, though, including Common Chiffchaffs, Eurasian Blackbirds, Eurasian Magpies, Rose-ringed Parakeets and then, an especially exciting discovery—my lifer Sardinian Warblers!
Before the trip, I spent a lot of time learning the differences between Sardinian Warblers (shown here) and Eurasian Blackcaps. Once in the field, it was easy to tell them apart—as long as I managed to get a decent look!
What I hadn’t seen so far were any water features, but crossing under a giant gold-plated monument (the Monòlit a la festa de l’arbre de 1899), I encountered a couple of reflecting ponds. In them, I saw a “must-see” species I had somehow never observed in all of my travels—Graylag Goose! Along with the geese, I got good looks at both Black-headed and much beefier Yellow-legged Gulls. I kept an eye out for Lesser Black-backed Gulls, but could never confirm one the entire week.
I scored my lifer Graylag Geese right down the block from our hotel, in Ciutadella park. Note the Black-headed Gulls frolicking in the background.
I ended my session with a surprisingly robust 23 species, but my week of birding Barcelona had just begun. During the next few days, I kept my travel binoculars slung around my neck, birding tourist-jammed city streets as well as any greenery I could find. I spotted my only Eurasian Jackdaw in a tree on the well-known avenue, Passeig de Gracia. I was delighted to discover a flock of 20 adorable introduced (and lifer) Common Waxbills in the Placa de Gaudi, right across the street from the modern wonder, Sagrada Familia. (This cathedral, designed by the brilliant Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí, is reason enough to visit Barcelona!) I finally saw the trip’s first European Greenfinches and Long-tailed Tits in the marvellous Parc Güell—one of the city’s better urban birding places and another great place to see Gaudí’s handiwork. My best urban birding opportunity, though, still lay ahead.
Though Common Waxbills are species introduced from Africa, I was thoroughly enchanted by these little “red bandits” when I encountered them across from Sagrada Familia (phone photo).
On our fourth day in Barcelona, we caught the H14 bus to the Parel-lel Metro station, but instead of boarding the Metro, we rode the funicular up the hill to Montjuïc, a prominent mini-mountain overlooking the city’s southern area. Only a couple of hundred meters away from the exit stood one of our top cultural destinations, Fundació Juan Miró, aka the Miró museum. A bit less famous than Picasso, Miró was Picasso’s contemporary, and even better, we caught a joint exhibit featuring the work of both men. After a thoroughly enjoyable hour or two there—and excellent quiche in their café—we walked up the hill heading for an even more exciting destination. Along the way—and with the help of Merlin’s Sound ID—I located my lifer Eurasian Blackcap.
One of the most common birds I encountered in Spain, the Common Chiffchaff always brought a smile to my face, both for its name and its lively behavior. That said, I also always doubted my ID of this bird since they come in several shades of yellow and brown.
We emerged onto a road running along the top of Montjuïc and were making our way gradually downhill toward the Olympic stadium, when I spotted what looked like a prairie dog in a small field below and to our right. I had other suspicions, however, and raised my binoculars to find those suspicions confirmed: a Eurasian Hoopoe! I hadn’t seen one since Israel, but they are apparently a lot less common in Spain, and I was delighted to see its Picasso-esque crest, long curved bill, and graphic brown, white, and black color pattern. I was glad to show it to Amy, too, since we had first seen one together in Ethiopia almost 20 years before!
The first Black Redstart I saw in Spain was working over balcony planters in a densely packed neighborhood of apartment buildings in Barceloneta—a clue to how adaptable this handsome species is.
Another couple of hundred meters brought us to Jardí Bòtanic de Barcelona, and my pulse accelerated as we paid our 3-Euro entry fees and entered. Finally, I would get to bird a somewhat natural area! The only question was, what I would find?
The visit got off to a great start with sightings of Black Redstarts, European Robins, and another blackcap. Making our way around to a little pond, the excitement accelerated with half a dozen flycatching Common Chiffchaffs, another Black Redstart, and a pair of White-Wagtails—the fourth country I’ve now seen this bird in.
Though I’d seen European Robins in Amsterdam, Israel, and Japan, this is the first one that ever fully cooperated with my camera. Love it!
As we headed up to the higher parts of the gardens, a series of unfamiliar high notes pierced the air. I looked around and detected movement on a nearby tree trunk. It belonged to none other than a pair of Short-toed Treecreepers, a bird stunningly analogous to our Brown Creepers, and a species I never thought I’d see in Spain. Awesome!!!!
A series of high sharp notes alerted me to the presence of several Short-toed Treecreepers, a species I had only dared hope to see in Spain.
The treecreepers weren’t the last birds we saw in the gardens, but they were probably the coolest. Our 80-minute visit plus the Miró museum marked this as our most fun day so far—but I had one more major Barcelona birding adventure scheduled for the last day of the trip. Find out what it was by reading my next post. Same bird time. Same bird channel.
Not many of us have the resources to bird outside of our own regions, and if you are part of that large club, you’re in luck. Braden is spending the spring semester of his junior year studying abroad in Costa Rica. He has 16 full weekends to work with and it’s no surprise that birding is on the agenda for every one of them. Here is his latest report—to a place that is not only a wonderful birding destination, but a model of sustainable agriculture. Enjoy!
I arrived at La Reserva El Copal just as the sun dipped behind the rainforest-covered foothills, my clothes soaked with sweat and every part of my body tired from the four bus rides and two-hour walk it had taken to get to one of Costa Rica’s best birding locations. My weekends in Monteverde and Jaco had been eventful and fun, but I was in need of some solo birding time, and so four days earlier I had made a reservation for this inexpensive, out-of-the-way property sitting on the lower slopes of the Cordillera de Talamanca. Patricia and Beto, the couple that ran the reserve, warmly welcomed me as darkness fell, showing me to my room and then to the dining hall for a dinner by candlelight. As I stared at the photos of rare and colorful hummingbirds on the walls, I realized that I was the only guest staying here for the night. Patricia served my rice and beans and said that she and Beto usually lived in Pejibaye, the town the final bus had dropped me off in, and only came up here when guests arrived, which wasn’t particularly frequently in January and February. This surprised me, given El Copal’s location and the high number of desirable bird species reported from here.
Even a glance of the grounds explains why El Copal is one of Costa Rica’s top birding destinations.
The next morning I arose at dawn, grabbed my binoculars and camera and headed off into the property as the trees began to glow with increasing sunlight. Almost immediately after stepping outside, a small, dark hummingbird buzzed by me, stopping to feed at one of the many flower bushes adorning the property. Despite the fact that it was still dark, I could clearly see the brilliant white cap for which the bird was named—Snowcap, which, in the weeks leading up to my trip to Costa Rica, had quickly risen up the ranks as one of my most-wanted birds. Rare denizens of the Caribbean slope, there were very few places in the country where these birds were reliable. El Copal was one of them, and I ended up seeing at least half a dozen of them during my stay here. The tiny, fairy-like hummingbirds eliminated any doubt I had about making this trip!
El Copal is one of the few places to reliably see Snowcap hummingbirds, and fortunately, they are there in abundance!
El Copal is full of rare birds. Back in the late 90s, the land now holding El Copal had been purchased by several families for agriculture. Instead of developing the rainforest, however, they decided to first establish a form of sustainable agriculture, then open it up for ecotourism, preserving much of the primary forest on the property. Now, some of Costa Rica’s most sought-after birds (and other animals) thrive here, thanks to the decision of those local farmers. This includes the Snowcap and a variety of other hummingbirds, as well as my #1 Target Bird for the whole country: Yellow-eared Toucanet. Of the six toucan species found in the country, this toucanet is the rarest, only found in middle elevation-rainforest on the Caribbean slope. El Copal seemed to be one of the best places to find them in the whole world, and I had my fingers crossed as I headed up the steep trails leading into the reserve.
The morning was…complicated. I heard a whole lot of birdsong, but very few of the singers actually presented themselves for good looks. Merlin (the bird identification app developed by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology) was only so helpful, as there are significantly fewer recordings of Latin American species than North American species. Bird sounds that the app identified for me included Bright-rumped Attila, Broad-billed Motmot, and Northern Schiffornis, the latter of which is an entirely brown bird with one of the most entertaining whistling songs I’ve ever heard. Despite my frustration at not being able to see many of the birds hidden in the foliage, I did get eyes on a few. I spotted both a Collared Aracari and a Keel-billed Toucan, two species of toucans quite common in this type of rainforest. And I did lay eyes on several large, mixed flocks of tanagers, colorful birds that traverse the forest in search of fruit. The species I picked out at the tops of trees included Silver-throated, Emerald, Speckled, Golden-hooded, Hepatic, Summer, Scarlet-rumped, Tawny-crested, Black-and-yellow, and Bay-headed Tanagers. I also got to watch a family group of coatis quietly foraging on the trail ahead of me. They scattered when I stepped on a branch by accident.
The tanagers put on a real show around the El Copal lodge—including this spectacular Emerald Tanager.
I returned to the main property for breakfast, then headed off on a different trail, this one leading down towards a stream. I found a Buff-rumped Warbler foraging on the rocks in the water, and peered around tree ferns and buttressed trees to try and glimpse the calls I was hearing. This trail also took a left turn and then continued up the mountain, and further up I spotted Scarlet-rumped Caciques and Chestnut-headed Oropendolas, big grackle-like birds making crazy calls. As I rounded a corner, a shiny green bird with a long bill alighted on a branch in front of me. The bird’s beak was longer and thinner than that of a kingfisher, and it had a warm, orange belly complementing its shimmering, green back: a Rufous-tailed Jacamar! Few birds had given me such a good look that morning, and I stood there for several minutes, watching the bird peer down at me curiously. A few minutes later, a large Ornate Hawk-Eagle soared through a gap in the trees, and my attitude began to improve—the birds were showing themselves! On the way down, I heard a rising and falling song, signifying the presence of an antbird. I poked around a little, eventually getting eyes on a Bicolored Antbird overturning leaves! This species, like many other antbirds, are ant-following obligates, meaning that they depend on army ants to find food. As large swarms of army ants rush through the rainforest, they stir up and scare hundreds of other insects, who leap out of the way, straight into the waiting mouths of antbirds, antwrens, woodcreepers and a variety of other birds that just follow the ants around. Ground-cuckoos, one of the most enigmatic groups of birds, also belong to this ant-following group.
While I didn’t actually lay eyes on any army ants, the antbirds signified that there must have been some nearby. The leafcutter ants, meanwhile, were everywhere. Their trails ran alongside and crisscrossed the walking trails, and I always had to keep an eye on the ground so I wouldn’t step on any.
One of the best parts of my visit to El Copal was meeting Carlos, who pointed out this perched Ornate Hawk-Eagle near the lodge.
When I arrived back at the lodge for lunch, another birder who had just arrived pointed out another Ornate Hawk-Eagle, this one perched up on a distant snag. As I peered at the bird through his spotting scope, he introduced himself as Carlos, a local also living in Pejibaye. Carlos is an English teacher and regularly visits El Copal during weekends to search for the hundreds of bird species found here. I told him that I hailed from the University of Maine, and spoke of my hunt for the Yellow-eared Toucanet. He looked at his watch. “I’ve got a few more hours…do you want to hike the trails and look for the toucanet together?” So, after a quick lunch, we headed back up the mountain in search of my target.
Thanks to my chance meeting with Carlos, a teacher and Costa Rican bird expert who can identify most of the birds by sound, I got to see one of my most sought-after Costa Rican species (keep reading).
Carlos’s knowledge of the birds of the area was impressive. For one, he could identify many of the calls I’d felt hopeless about earlier, which included more species of antbirds, Collared Trogon, and several species of wrens. He also knew exactly where all the birds hung out, at one spot pointing down the side of the cliff to a White-crowned Manakin, a tiny black bird with a white cap, sitting in a bush fifty meters away. “He’s always here.”
As we gained altitude, I could begin to see the influence of cloud forest. Slightly different species lived here, and the plant composition looked different, too. One thing in particular made us realize we’d entered a higher-altitude area, however. “Toucanet!” Carlos yelled, pointing to a large, bromeliad-covered tree rising from the slope. I held my binoculars up to see, not my target bird, but an entirely green toucan: a Northern Emerald Toucanet! We tried in vain to photograph the species but neither of our cameras would cooperate, although it will be a long time before I forgot what it felt like to see that bird. This species is much more common at higher altitudes, and it was the first time Carlos had ever seen one on the property! It was, of course, a lifer (a bird I’ve never seen before) for me. As if the Emerald Toucanet wasn’t enough, as we rounded the corner, Carlos stopped me again.
Slowly and quietly, he pointed out a large-ish bird sitting about twenty meters in front of us, up in a tree. The bird was black, with a chestnut cap complementing the blue and green skin around its eye. Its long yellow and black beak, combined with green wings, orange flanks and red rump, identified it as the bird I’d been searching for: a female (hembra in Spanish) Yellow-eared Toucanet. I just about lost my mind, holding my camera up slowly with shaky hands. Never had I actually believed I would lay eyes on one, and yet, here one was, right in front of us. Then, the male appeared, sporting that yellow ear the species was named after.
Again thanks to Carlos, I had an unforgettable experience with the bird at the top of my “must see” list—a pair of Yellow-eared Toucanets (male shown here).
We enjoyed the birds for about ten minutes, then headed off, as Carlos had to get back home. I thanked him profusely for sharing these amazing birds with me, and we exchanged contact information. Then, I spent the rest of the evening looking at and deleting photos and enjoying the tanagers feeding in the fruiting trees in front of the rooms. Before I went to bed, I spotted several of what I believe to be bioluminescent beetles flying through the rainforest (though they may have been fireflies. I’m not good with bugs.).
No, this Speckled Tanager was not touched up by artists for my visit!
In total, I spotted 117 species at El Copal over the weekend, including a few the next morning like King Vulture, Gartered Trogon and Green Thorntail. La Reserva El Copal could be described as nothing short of magical. Are there places like this that you’ve always wanted to visit? A mountain range full of endemic plants? A reserve dedicated to protecting endangered amphibians? Perhaps your bucket list is topped with places like the Serengeti, the Great Barrier Reef, the ancient castles of Ireland? If you are, the Gilman Scholarship can help you get to these places! Studying abroad is an experience that every student should have the opportunity to have, and the Gilman helps put this philosophy into practice. The money they awarded me has helped me afford to go on adventures like this, the rain-forested foothills of Costa Rica, and they can help you too! So please, if you’re considering studying abroad (which you should be), apply to the Gilman!
I stood on the wooden platform a hundred feet above the forest floor, staring down the long metal cable leading off into the foliage. The ziplining guide unhooked the carabiner on my belt from one line and attached it to another, then banged on the cable with a wooden bat—a signal to whoever was on the other end that I was ready to go. A colorful iguana watched from a nearby tree as I leaned back, grabbed the cable with my leather gloves, and jumped into the air. Humid, tropical wind hit me as I zipped past epiphyte-covered trees, and I heard the calls of parrots flying over. Thirty seconds later, I landed on the next platform, where the guide unclipped my carabiner and clipped it to another cable for another thrilling ride. An hour and fourteen platforms later, I touched down on the ground and joined the rest of the USAC students in gushing about how awesome ziplining had been—just the beginning to an exhilarating, chaotic weekend on the Pacific coast of Costa Rica.
I’m going to get the, ahem, hang of this eventually!
After lunch, our program directors took us to the coastal tourist town of Jaco. Some people split off to take a paid surfing lesson, but I opted to stay on the main beach and enjoy the waves. As my friends and I waded into the warm, salty water, we discovered that we were not alone. As we swam in the surf, something soft and slimy suddenly collided with my leg.
“Ack!” I cried, jumping backwards. Everyone around me stared. “What?”
A pair of fins appeared in the water to our left. Sharks! my mind shouted, but a sudden rolling wave gave us a glance at their true identities—stingrays! And the Pacific Cownose Rays (according to our limited research on Google) were not strong swimmers. Every time a more powerful wave rolled in, it carried the animals straight into us. Thankfully, none of the human—stingray collisions ended in harm to either party, but feeling a large, slimy animal run into me was not something I got used to.
The beach at Jaco—a favorite for tourists and stingrays!
We retired from the beach to the hostel where we would be staying for the night, a mere hundred meters from the ocean. As the sun set, however, our activities continued. At around 5, two of my friends and I went on a probably ill-advised walk through the town of Jaco in search of owls. We ended up on a long dirt road leading towards the jungle. Before we got there, brooding clouds materialized above us, and a downpour soaked our clothes. We didn’t see any owls (or at least not well), but we did spot a few other night birds, including Lesser Nighthawks and Common Pauraques. Upon our soggy return to Jaco, we stopped briefly on a bridge crossing a small stream in town. There, in the dark, moonlit water, stood a tall, powerful-looking heron, staring straight down into the current. We watched from the bridge as the Bare-throated Tiger-Heron crept closer and closer to its desired target. After five minutes of holding our breaths, the heron plunged its neck into water, pulling out a fish and swallowing it whole!
That night, our entire cohort of students went out for drinks in downtown Jaco (the legal drinking age in Costa Rica is 18). Some of us grew restless sitting in the bars, however, and made our way back to the beach to watch the ocean pound relentlessly into the dark sand. Near our hostel, a river mouth emptied into the ocean, running in all directions to create a maze of shallow streams and sandbars. And there, under the moon, we spotted more herons, fishing in the dark. Another tiger-heron strutted on the shore. Two Yellow-crowned Night-herons fought over a frog dinner. But the coolest animal we saw was a bird straight out of a horror movie—the uncommon and elusive Boat-billed Heron (I didn’t take a picture because it was so dark but you should definitely look this thing up). There on the sand it stood, with large, dark, soulless eyes complementing its wild, black hairdo. Its bill looked more like a shovel than a boat, and we watched as it rushed into the water, chasing after a fish.
Scarlet Macaws in flight.
The next morning, Kiley, Leah and I caught an Uber to Playa Hermosa (“Beautiful Beach”—one of several Playa Hermosas scattered around the country) south of Jaco. Silvery streaks of sand ran across the less-touristed coastline, but the biggest prize had little to do with the ocean. Planted along the edge of the sand stood large trees of many species, including palms and almonds. Feeding on those almonds were giant, long-tailed Scarlet Macaws! The macaws flew over us in groups of two to four, calling abrasively and flashing the streaks of blue and yellow that decorated their otherwise crimson bodies. At one point, one landed no more than ten feet away, and we watched and filmed it in awe. Scarlet Macaws are a threatened species because of the illegal pet trade and habitat loss, but their story in Costa Rica is one of success. After declining significantly in the 1900s, Scarlet Macaws are increasing in numbers on both the Pacific and Caribbean coasts of the country, thanks to conservation work. They are now once again a common sight in much of Costa Rica.
Scarlet Macaws feeding in trees along the beach. Their beaks are especially designed to crush the largest, hardest nuts!
The next morning, our last of the weekend, eight of us caught an early-morning bus north to Carara National Park, one of the last tracts of pristine Pacific lowland rainforest in the country. Once we bought our tickets and entered the park (if you go, make SURE to buy tickets online in advance—it was a hassle doing it there), we followed a trail deep into the forest, marveling at the height and circumference of the smooth-barked trees rising before us. Many of the trees had thick buttresses stretching out from their bases. Here, the deeper soils held little nutrients, so tree roots stretched out rather than down. Leaf-cutter ant trails crossed the trail every couple hundred meters, and we thanked a guide who pointed out a White-lined Bat roosting on the side of a tree.
One of several troops of leaf-cutter ants we enjoyed watching.
White-faced Capuchins preening during siesta time.A basilisk, or Jesus Christ, lizard.
Loafing on a log laid across a bubbling river we spotted not one but two Brown Basilisks or Jesus Christ Lizards, that special reptile with the ability to run on water. White-faced Capuchins stared down at us from trees as they picked through each other’s fur, and we startled a White-nosed Coati from the trail, where it had been quietly gobbling down ants. We got great views of Slaty-tailed Trogons—big, red-bellied birds that look kind of like frogs—and a Yellow-throated Toucan that flew in as we watched yet more Scarlet Macaws. My personal bird of the day was a Black-faced Antthrush, a small, quiet songbird poking through the leaf litter about fifty meters away from the trail. This lowland rainforest (which was the final of the three prominent forest types in the country for me to visit) held many species from the tropical dry forest, too, as Carara National Park sits near the zone where the two habitats blend together. To see true, pure lowland tropical rainforest, however, we’ll have to visit the Osa Peninsula or Manuel Antonio National Park, quite a bit farther south.
My favorite bird of the weekend, a Black-faced Antthrush.Slaty-tailed Trogon, one of nine trogon species in Costa Rica.
