Back to Costa Rica: Birding El Toucanet Lodge

Black Guans are very docile for their size...they lack the courage of a chachalaca and the brazenness of a guan, and the unabashed curls of a currasow. Unlike all three, you are much more likely to find this bird feeding on berries up in the trees than running around on the ground like a mutant forest-sanderling.

I bet you didn't see this coming, did you? Well I still have not completed coverage of the BB&B winter tour of Costa Rica (2012-2013), and I thought I would change things up a bit and return to Costa Rica for a post. After all, it is the middle of June...with not much birding to be done, its time to start thinking about that winter trip to the tropics.

When we left off with The Pitta Incident, Stilt, Dipper Dan, Frank (spirit bird: Double-crested Cormorant) and I finished birding on the west coast and retreated inland. After much weeping, Dan and I dropped off Frank and Stilt at the airport and struck out on our own. Where to go? We did what we thought was best and headed south, and for the second time of the trip (after picking up some genital pastries) made our way into the Talamanca Mountains.

We decided to check out El Toucanet Lodge, a relatively cheap birder-friendly lodge that had been recommended by Patrick O'Donnell, the living birding legend of Costa Rica. The lodge sits at a lower elevation than the more popular Paraiso Del Quetzales and the Savegre resort, and not surprisingly had some different birds to offer. Like every other birdercentric place we stayed in Costa Rica, the birding was of a high caliber and everything else was tranquilo. And for those of you with pinche Spanish-speaking skills, the owner is an American ex-pat and knows his birds very well. The property isn't large but the birding along the driveway and along the road up-canyon was very rewarding, and the hummingbird scene is a good one as well.

Brown-capped Vireo! I know, I know, it doesn't look like anything fancy, but it is a bird I really wanted to see. El Toucanet was the only place we recorded them on this trip.

Brown-capped Vireo looks like a cross between a Philadelphia and Warbling Vireo, which is kind of disturbing when you think about it because birders don't fare very well telling those two apart anyway. They really are quite brown above though, so it is a bird with a useful name. I thought I saw one through the fog in an epic mixed flock up in a Mexican cloud forest once, but couldn't bring myself to count it...no problem now though.

In the spirit of birds with useful names, here is a Yellowish Flycatcher. I honestly don't know what to say about it. I'm at a loss for words. It is a flycatcher that is very yellowish. God Bless the Empidonax.

It bears more than a passing resemblance to "Western" Flycatcher, but luckily for the birder, Pacific-slope/Cordilleran don't go south to Costa Rica. Yellow-bellied Flycatchers abound though, so it's good to be Empid-literate if you go down there during winter.

El Toucanet introduced us to our first Stripe-tailed Hummingbirds of the trip, which we also had later at Savegre.

Stripe-taileds range from southern Mexico to Panama, most often at middling elevations. Birds in Costa Rica and Panama are of the egregia subspecies, with two other subspecies being described for populations to the north.

There was no shortage of tiny Selasphorous hummers coming to the feeders at El Toucanet. They were all immatures/females, and all of them that we could identify appeared to be Volcano Hummingbirds (above). I'm sure scintillants show up there as well, but we could not find any.

Here is a more familiar bird you might appreciate. Golden-winged Warblers are fairly common winter residents in Costa Rica, and can be found at a wide variety of habitats and elevations throughout country. We saw many, which was a cause for much celebration.

Common Bush-Tanagers are the anchor for many mixed flocks in Costa Rica. I'm always glad to see them, because you never know what may be lurking in their ranks.

A random view from the deck of their lounge/restaurant. Not bad, eh?

Another perk of hanging out on the deck is the chance to see Magenta-throated Woodstar! I wish I got a photo that did this bird justice, but you get the idea here I hope. This was another species that we relished at the lodge and saw no place else.

The Talamancas are thick with Green Violet-Ears. The feeders at El Toucanet are no exception. I know this isn't exactly a crush, but I cannot deny the appeal of those outstretched "ears".

Look at this...an accidental vagina pastry! I told you we had genital food. They weren't bad at all, and they all looked like vaginas. Accidental vagina pastries are not available at El Toucanet, so it would be weird to ask for them. More from El Toucanet and the Talamancas in the next Costa Rica post (whenever that is).

Birding the Mountain of Death

We had Volcano Hummingbirds at a number of sites on this trip, but they were most numerous and cooperative at Cerro de la Muerte. 

Onward we birded. After El Paraiso, we birded other sites in the Talamancas with only moderate success. Then war began within our once-happy ranks. We could not decide if we should take our puny, underpowered rental car (ironically called a "Swift", it was punishingly weak) down the steep, winding road to San Gerardo de Dota, otherwise known as The Promised Land. Eventually, the car proved its worthlessness over and over again so we decided against it. Dipper Dan and I would return some days later in a SUV, and we were both happy that we did not attempt to tackle the road with the wimpy Swift.

After spending a rainy night in an uncomfortable bed at La Georgina, we decided to try to barge the Swift up El Cerro de la Muerte, the tallest peak in Costa Rica at over 11,000 feet. Why? To get Volcano Junco, of course. Although our guidebook warned against driving up the mountain without 4-wheel drive, we made it up without mishap. The fog enveloped us, and the search was on.

What a pleasant bird to have holding down the mountaintops. Males in different populations of Volcano Hummingbird have different colored gorgets; I think there are three populations in Costa Rica that can be told apart by the males' throat color.

Volcano Hummingbird is actually a Selasphorus hummingbird, which is the same genus as our beloved Broad-tailed, Rufous, Allen's and Calliope Hummingbirds. Nice to see a somewhat familiar looking bird down there, although none of the northern Selasphorus possess such a short bill.

Sooty-capped Bush-Tanagers are one of the main ingredients of high elevation flocks. Their bold head patterns are a lot more striking than their lower-elevation Common cousins.

What a strange bird. Reminds me of some of the huge, exotic-looking finches down there.

Dipper Dan adopts an unexpectedly awkward, sasquatch-like gait while lurching through the foggy Paramo in search of the day's target bird, Volcano Junco. 

Jose, a guide at Paraiso del Quetzales, told us the exact place to go where we would be guaranteed to find the Junco of the Volcano. As you can see, Jose knows exactly what he is fucking talking about. At the promised intersection, the juncos showed themselves.

It was nice to be stalking a species that were not masters of skulk. We all got great looks at this highly-localized bird, which is only found above treeline at certain sites in Costa Rica and Panama.

The juncos were in constant need of delicious berries. You show me berries, I show you juncos.

A female Slaty Flowerpiercer. These things are everywhere in the higher altitudes of the Talamancas. Can you believe this is a type of finch? Look at that bill...it really is shaped that way for piercing flowers. Craziness. Darwin would have loved this bird.

A nice little stop south of El Cerro is Villa Mills, where this Black-capped Flycatcher was brutally crushed. An easy, relatively open space to bird, it made for a mellow side-stop on our way down to San Isidro. A number of Timberline Wrens were vocalizing here.

This is what a "confiding" bird looks like, in case you are wondering.

Are you at a high elevation? You will find Blue-and-white Swallows. Are you at a low elevation? I will show you Blue-and-white Swallows. Photographed at Villa Mills.

As we descended from the Talamancas down into the new and wonderful realms of the South Pacific Slope, we saw our first Swallow-tailed Kites of the trip. I'm still looking forward to seeing them up close some day. Next stop: Talari Mountain Lodge!

When there is no internet, no tv, but plenty of alcohol, conditions are perfect for playing "Pocket", the simplest and greatest game in the world that leads to a whole rainbow of bizarre and humiliating acts. Here Frank is forced to wear filthy, fungus-ridden boots on his hands for an extended period of time. This is in a room at La Georgina, a birding site/restaurant/place to stay downslope from El Cerro. We didn't have much luck in terms of birds, amenities, or comfort, but it was cheap and had easy access to a lot of food and a shitload of strange (but usually tasty) Tico candy.