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Zeebra Designs & Destinations

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Zeebra Designs & Destinations

Tag Archives: Ecuador Christmas Bird Count Manabi

SHHHH! Bird Specialists in Training!

08 Wednesday Jan 2020

Posted by Playamart - Zeebra Designs in Ecuador, NATURE, One Bird At A Time, PEOPLE, TRAVEL: LATIN AMERICA

≈ 31 Comments

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Birding |Manabi Province, Ecuador Christmas Bird Count Manabi, poza honda ecuador

SHHHH! Bird Specialists in Training! (Part One)

(Poza Honda Reservoir – Manabi Province, Ecuador)    Just past ten in the morning, our birding party of three peered beyond the rustic bamboo corral in hopes of identifying the raucous oropendolas that had been playing hide and seek with us for the past two hours.  Luis Saltos – bird guide from Chone and Mindo – and I were guests of “Don Jorge” Arnet, owner of a lovingly-tended tract of land at Poza Honda.  (Jorge also owns the house that I rented for the past two years before I moved to Portoviejo.)  The three of us were conducting an all-day census of bird species in the area with hopes of the area being approved for Audubon’s 2020 Christmas Count.  We had been birding since 6 A.M. in intermittent drizzle.

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A few hours earlier that morning, two birds buzzed us, and we exclaimed, “What was THAT?” as I snapped two out-of-focus images of the rapidly-vanishing birds. “Oropendola?” I looked at Luis for confirmation. “That whooshing sound?”

P2880513 yes dos oropendulas

P2880528 7 19 jorge y luis checking oropendula info

Left: “Jorge” Arnet, owner of Casa Poza Honda and coffee/cacao farm; Right: Luis Saltos, bird guide from Mindo and Chone.

We consulted several books and hoped to see those birds again.   The (McMullan/Navarrete) Fieldbook for the Birds of Ecuador places all species of oropendolas in other areas of the country. This particular elusive group of birds must have taken a holiday vacation to Poza Honda, and we were trying to decide, “Russet-backed or Chestnut-headed.”  Two years ago my friend Xiomara and I saw and photographed one Chestnut headed Oropendola, so my bets were on that species. Photos are oh so important in documenting out-of-range species, even if the photo is a bad one.

P2880653 oropendula

P2880634 oropendula

P2880659 jorge y luis

I waited at the next curve and watched Oropendolas fly towards my friends. “Did you see them?” I exclaimed later, “Yes!” they replied, “Lots!”

There were fleeting glimpses of ‘a lot’ half an hour later – then another viewing half an hour later near the bamboo corral. The Oropendolas were out of sight, but my drizzle-baptized camera managed to document one Rufous-headed Chachalaca in the distance, one Tropical Gnatcatcher way up high, and a Long-billed Hermit inspecting flowers along the living fence.

P2880842 chachalaca out of focus dec 30P2880841 TROPICAL GNATCATCHER Dec 30 just before 10 de AgostoP2880845 barons hermit at bamboo corral

P2880843 Golden Olive Woodpecker

‘Don’t forget about me,’ says the Golden-olive Woodpecker!

P2880866 a year ago there was one long human searching for birds. now there are four

States the mule: “A year ago there was one lone human staring at the birds. Now there are four!”

SHHH BIRD SPECIALISTS IN TRAINING HEADER IMAGE.jpg

The last thing I expected to see was another human on the seldom-traveled road and staring at the three of us. A tall, lean and well-scrubbed young man, he wore an expression of curiosity as if observing Santa Clause placing last-minute gifts beneath a tree – or gnomes and fairies in another realm. Continue reading →

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