A Calcutt's Pictures

After our first couple hikes in Monte Verde we were a bit apprehensive about our final day and the early morning birding tour we had signed up for. We made our way up the hill to the Curi-Cancha reserve to meet our guide, and like before, started off with some hummingbirds. This time the weather was much better though and the “hummers” were enjoying and fighting over the large verbena bushes on the edge of the parking lot. By this point we had come to expect the hummingbirds, but these were a joy to watch.

My favorite was the purple-throated mountain-gem. This little male was quite interesting to look at the entire time with lots of wild copper and green color on its chest and sides, as well as a clear white line coming off the eye. The real stunner though is when it turns to look at you. At that point you get a chance to see that purple throat and his metallic blue green cap. The color comes from the structure of the feathers, which makes it very directional. You can see the difference in the two images below which were taken only about 2 seconds apart. It was really incredible to witness.

The show from the parking lot continued though, and we ended up spending about a half hour admiring various birds right from there.There were Baltimore orioles, brown jays, and even parrots. From there we headed off into the woods to find some of the more elusive species.

Over our first few stops in the woods it became clear that we had a truly excellent guide for the day. He was extremely engaging and clearly loved spending time looking for these birds. He was always happy to answer questions and seemed to immediately know where to find every bird we saw in his massive book of costa rican birds. He pointed out a number of trogans, flycatchers, and tanagers, but I’m going to skip over all of those for now, as you have seen all those already in my previous posts. Ok fine, I can’t resist. here’s just one for you:

Now if you have ever looked into birding in Costa Rica you have surely heard of the resplendent quetzal. This bird is famous for its color and impressive tail feathers, but we had yet to spot one on our trip. This wasn’t too surprising, as they are quite reclusive. Given that we were quite surprised to hear our guide confidently check his watch and say something like “well, we should head to the avocado tree, the quetzal should be arriving soon.” We hadn’t been let down yet though, so we were happy to head that way. It turns out the quetzal took an extra half hour to arrive, but sure enough it did eventually come and sit in the avocado tree that he took us to. She was still pretty tough to get a good look at, but she definitely did look nice. The crowds of people quickly closed in and before long there were about 40 people admiring this one bird. It was pretty surreal.

At this point we were riding high and thinking that this was clearly a tour that was well worth our time. However, the guide had more in store. We continued to walk the grounds of the reserve and were treated to a couple of encounters that were even more incredible. The first was an emerald toucanet that was enjoying the berries on some of the bushes on the side of the trail. It happily hopped from branch to branch and gave us lots of opportunities to admire it. It’s a pretty large bird that we had previously only seen from a distance, so it was a very special moment.

The second memorable encounter of the day was a lesson’s motmot that we came across perched on a branch at chest height right on the edge of the trail. It simply sat there looking for insects with it’s bright red eye, and didn’t seem to care at all that about 10 people were circled around it admiring the amazing colors in it’s head and neck, as well as the incredibly distinctive tail.

The Curri-Cancha reserve is different from the cloud forests in that it is not an entirely natural environment, but a former plantation mixed with some old growth forest. The result is a much more open feel, with fields and much more open views. This gave the reserve a lot more variety in the trails than elsewhere, and we had a wonderful time exploring them. After the end of our tour we even came back for another hike later in the day and explored a bit more.

In the end Curi-Cancha was the perfect capstone to our adventures in Costa Rica. We wrapped up the day happy and the next morning started our trip back down the mountain and to the airport. It’s an incredible country that I feel like we just barely scratched the surface of. I would highly recomment it to anyone with a sense of adventure and a desire to see some wildlife.

Taken 2/19/23