yellow-crowned night heron – Wildly Mistaken

That is, one hundred species of birds. That’s right, last week in Shenandoah National Park, in addition to spotting all those lovely wildflowers, I reached 100 species in my 2017 bird blitz. Now that it’s been a few days I am actually sitting at 104, but who’s counting? (Me.) Eleven more of those birds are new to my life list, bringing that total to twenty-one – which means there are 20 birds on my pre-existing life list I can miss and still reach my goal (exceed in 2017 the number of birds on my pre-2017 life list). There are somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 that I don’t stand a great chance of seeing this year, so that target is getting tantalizingly close.

Phalacrocorax auritus (8) — A double-crested cormorant in the Everglades

Those new-to-me birds finally started branching out from the waterfowl. I’m starting to round out my sparrows (fox, American tree, and swamp) and entering the manic, zippy world of warblers (pine, yellow-rumped, and palm). The black-crowned night heron has been a conspicuous blank spot for me for years, so that was a welcome find.

A yellow-crowned night heron in Sligo Creek Park last month

So, let’s pause the self-congratulations and talk about the other side. What have I missed? ebird.com has a handy tool called “target species.” If I set it to April and Montgomery County it will spit out a list of birds, in order of abundance (represented by % of checklists containing that bird). This tells me what birds in my area I’ve probably walked right by the most. Here are my top ten whiffs: northern parula (14.2%), common yellowthroat (11.3%), field sparrow (11.3%), green heron (9.1%), Louisiana waterthrush (9.1%), chimney swift (8.6%), white-eyed vireo (6.4%), great crested flycatcher (5.9%), prothonotary warbler (5.7%), and Bonaparte’s gull. Like last time, feel free to troll me with all your beautiful photos of those birds.

Speaking of photos… I don’t exactly have a ton of good ones of this new group of 32 birds. I have pulled some from my archives which are at least the same species. It turns out that birds – especially small ones like warblers and sparrows – are not the easiest things to photograph with an iPhone and/or a mid-range point-and-shoot. I did buy a decent spotter’s scope a month or so ago, and it’s been a great tool, but I haven’t quite mastered the skill of aiming the thing while lining up my camera lens with the eyepiece. I’ll get there.

An eastern phoebe in Meadowbrook Park

An eastern phoebe at Violette’s Lock

Lucky bird #100 was a barn swallow in a tree near the back of Big Meadows (and soon after I spotted another in flight nearby). Barn swallows are a common sight in the spring and summer months around here; in my neighborhood they like to nest under the structures in Brookside Gardens which sit out over the ponds. If I had to hazard a guess, bird 105 will be a green heron – they too like to hang out in the park near my home and they’re conspicuous. You never know, though – that great egret was picked up entirely by accident while driving on the highway for a work trip.

Hirundo rustica (5) — Some barn swallows in Wheaton Regional Park last year

List of birds since the last check-in (new to life list in bold):

73. double-crested cormorant
74. red-tailed hawk
75. fox sparrow
76. eastern phoebe
77. tundra swan
78. American tree sparrow
79. gadwall
80. golden eagle
81. yellow-crowned night heron
82. greater scaup
83. tree swallow
84. black-crowned night heron
85. swamp sparrow
86. blue-winged teal
87. brown-headed cowbird
88. pine warbler
89. golden-crowned kinglet
90. brown creeper
91. chipping sparrow
92. gray catbird
93. ruby-crowned kinglet
94. yellow-rumped warbler
95. Northern rough-winged swallow
96. blue-gray gnatcatcher
97. palm warbler
98. common raven
99. brown thrasher
100. barn swallow
101. house wren
102. osprey
103. Canvasback
104. great egret

Part 1: Mammals

Part 2: Reptiles

With most exciting and most abundant out of the way, it’s time for the most disproportionately beautiful group of animals in Costa Rica. That would be: birds. With a landmass about the size of West Virginia, Costa Rica is home to nearly 900 bird species – more than all of the US and Canada combined. With such variety in such tight quarters, one can’t help but stumble across some exceptional beauty now and again. Beyond that, even the most common birds seem more alive with color than our relatively drab robins, sparrows, and mockingbirds.

Much of the bird life does overlap with those familiar in North America, and we of course saw some of that: herons, egrets, and pelicans, for example, as well as many of the smaller brown or gray birds one tends not to really notice. But then there were the flocks of parakeets, the tropical kingbirds (Tyrannus melancholicus) and great kiskadees (Pitangus sulphuratus), and the two species of ani (black, crowlike birds with funky-looking beaks).

A Yellow-crowned night heron

A muscovy duck

A green heron

A tropical kingbird

One of the two species of ani

A great kiskadee

One of my priorities on the trip was to see some magnificent frigatebirds (Fregata magnificens). As with the basilisks, I’d been fascinated by them since childhood. We got this out of the way quickly via an evening boat tour. I wish I had better pictures from that evening; I recall it more fondly than I can account for with what I have. Our vantage point was from a distance as they soared high above, but it was enough to know that “magnificent” is the right word.

Toucans were another priority bird group, due in this case less to personal reasons and more to the universal agreement on the awesome beauty of toucans. We found a couple of emerald toucanets (Aulacorhynchus prasinus) in the Monteverde Cloud Forest, and they remain among the most beautiful animals on my lifetime list. I also caught sight of one of the larger species (either a keel-billed or chestnut-mandibled toucan) in flight – a glorious but fleeting view from our moving vehicle.

Among all the fascinating wildlife I did see stands at least one significant miss: the scarlet macaw (Ara macao). It’s far from the only wonder I missed, but we did hear some in Carara National Park. It’s another of my bucket list species, so that was a little frustrating (the first-worldiest of first-world problems encountered in pursuit of a first-world hobby… perspective). Anyway, I’d have insisted we try for longer but this was our travel day (the one with the crocodiles) and we had a check-in time to make.

On our first hike through the Monteverde Cloud Forest, our guide set up his scope, said “black guan” and had us take a look. A black guan (Chamaepetes unicolor), it turned out, was a sort of dark-feathered, arboreal turkey. A tad smaller and a lot less ugly than its northerly cousin, it nonetheless had that same furtive head bob.

Then there were the hummingbirds. Costa Rica has over fifty species (compared to one where I live and twenty or so in the entire US). It seemed like we saw all of them. It was probably only a half-dozen or so species but hummingbirds seemed omnipresent, especially in Monteverde. Their being hummingbirds and my lack of a high-speed lens conspired to limit my photo ops somewhat. I was a bit annoyed that the hostess of our hotel had both hummingbird feeders AND an outdoor cat, and would point out its stalking of the birds with amusement. I didn’t say anything but did work in some surreptitious facepalms.

This was the best shot I was able to capture of any of the hummingbirds, and I’ve no idea what species it is.

I’ve saved my favorite for last: the blue-crowned motmot (Momotus momota). This bird is a true standard-bearer for the beauty of nature.The blue crown for which it is named is maybe the third or fourth thing one notices, after the blue discs at the end of its very long tail feathers and the sharp blue-to-black contrast near its eye. We were able to watch three different individuals and had it been twenty I still would have been left wanting more.

motmot-5 — Yeah, I just posted 5 uninterrupted photos with no text. What of it?

There were hundreds more birds glimpsed too fleetingly to make an accurate ID. The forest was alive with an aerial parade of colors in motion. These final few images are of birds I couldn’t quite pin down – if anyone has a clue I’d appreciate the hand.