scarlet macaws on the Osa Penninsula

5am

It’s 5am on Sunday morning. In the big fig there are a flock of parrots, maybe 20 in all, making such an incredible racket. They are Red Lored parrots, mostly a bright emerald green with red foreheads and blue and red wing trim. They live in pairs within a greater flock and spend all of their time 30 to 40 feet up in the trees. They are comical and agile birds for the stocky, compact frames and the pairs seem to argue and bicker much of the time. Such a different picture from a single parrot in a cage. I didn’t realize they were canopy dwellers, I wonder how it feels to be a canopy species kept so close to the ground in captivity? Perhaps for captive bred birds there is no recollection of their natural state.
In the other big fig, further down are a pair of Slaty Tailed Trogons, cousins to the famous Resplendent Quetzal. The slaty tailed have orange beaks, dark emerald heads and chests and back fading into gray and a bright red belly (females are dark slate grey and read). They are inspecting a large termite nest. Trogons often nest in active termite mounds, the mounds providing excellent shelter and the termites providing a steady, handy supply of food.
Below them, perched precariously on the tips of banana leaves are a family of Tropical Kingbirds. It’s a new family, the young recently emerged from the nest and their parents are still feeding them. The Kingbirds are in the huge flycatcher family, and are among dozens of yellow breasted birds in this area. The kingbirds are quite small, about 6 inches and very vocal. They build beautiful covered nests, a mess of twigs and leaves slightly bigger than an american football with a igloo style entrance and a covered porch. If you walk within 8 feet of the nest the parents will call you repeatedly from close by on another tree trying to lure you away. They stay very close to their nests.
On the lawn are a pair of Variable Seedeaters. These are among my favourite birds in the garden. Very small, maybe 4 inches and the very sharp bright birds. The male is all black except for a tiny dot on his wing and the female is a dark brown. They flit to and fro singing very sweetly a series of random notes. They eat seeds and insects, and spend most of their time close to the ground. Their nest is a very simple, very thin walled cup – you can see light from one side of the nest to the other, and they build about 8 feet up in the bushes and trees.
Before me on the table is a vase of flowers, heliconias, seemingly hanging motionless in the air is a Long Billed Hermit feeding from them. He is about 4 foot from me. Hermits don’t mind distractions. They are so exquisitely balanced from their long arching saber like beak to their long straight drop down tail. The plainest of hummingbirds the hermits have a different sort of charm, intelligent, curious and actually I think rather friendly given their name.
Across the way I can hear the Montezuma Oropendolas. This is another favourite. They are big birds, 20 and 16 inches tall with naked blue and pink facial patches and a lemony yellow tail. The tail is about all I ever see of them as they stay in the thick of the canopy in this garden. But one knows they are there by their vocalizations – an incredible series of whoops, yips, brrips and an amazing noise like branches falling made by the males. The local flock is about 15 birds, I think, it’s difficult to count.
The parrots have gone, now I can hear other bird noise beyond the river but I don’t know who’s calling. I have a bird book, so far in the garden I have made checks beside 57 different species of birds. The boys who are avid birders have many more.

morning again

The variable seedeaters are right beside me in the hibiscus: a happy little family of four. Their light filled nest was in the pejabayes and I’m so happy to see that they will stay in the garden. The father is completely black but for a white dot on either shoulder, his partner and offspring are brown with speckled brown and fawn chests. I wonder if the plumage for juveniles is this brown or whether he has two female young? There are no seeds in the hibiscus, variable or otherwise, they must eat insects too. They have a pleasant family twitter going on – parents singing in that sweet rising melodious whistle and the little ones in that semi anxious babble of chips and tweets.
I’m sitting in an ugly cloud of mosquitoes. Big black nasty things. The heavy rains of last week resulted in a lot of puddles in forest leaves, old stumps and ditches. There has been rain since, but not enough to wash out the larvae, and just enough to keep the puddles filled. Now we have another 5 or 6 days of heavy mosquito presence. Yuck. I’m sitting with sweats on and a hoodie with the hood up. Fine at 6 in the morning on an overcast day, but in a couple of hours it’ll be hell.

waiting for the kettle to boil . . .

I glance out the kitchen window – there’s the lilac blue crab below the orange tree, tottering at an off-road angle part in and out of his burrow. For once he doesn’t bolt when he sees me. Close by a very successful female flycatcher – not sure what type – swoops from her perch scooping up flies who are glad of the sun. Were glad of the sun. A short tailed hermit hummingbird feeds from those red salvia like flowers I can’t find in the books. Below him two red and black butterflies flit between scrubby growth. There’s a movement in the cannonball tree: it’s the lone male howler monkey noisily crossing the little stream on his way to the big river trees. All around is the song of birds and the constant hum, throb, twitter of insects. Kettle’s boiled.

tomatoes

Even though tomatoes are native to Central and South America, they are not the easiest fruit to grow. I think it must be the commercial varieties and hybrids – they are too susceptible here to the fungus that humidity harbours. There is a local gardener who seems to have success with a small variety and he sells his occasional surplus to Moreno (our local shop-master and fountain of all knowledge). I’m using his seeds. The first lot I planted in the garden, I currently have 6 small plants, and by small I mean barely out of their sprout hood, but with true leaves and that incredibly wonderfully tomato plant scent which takes me right back to my grandfathers’ greenhouses. I have seeds drying on my desk waiting for a bit more sun. I’ll plant these in pots first I think. I know they don’t like to be moved, but I’m pretty sure they don’t like to be eaten by beetles and pelted with tropical storms either.
As I’m writing there’s a flock of Montezuma Oropendolas in the big fig. They must be among my favourite birds here, big, 20 inches tall with bright blue cheeks and yellow tails. But what I love about them is the noise they make. It’s too hard to describe – a sort of melodious clicking and tearing and whooping bantar with the males making a sound like branches breaking.

morning gift

Last weekend working in the garden I happened upon a thin nest about 8 feet up in the pejabaye palms. It was a family of variable seedeaters – one of my favourite birds in the garden. These small finches have such a pretty song and are happy to come close. The male is all black except for a white dot on each wing near the shoulder, the females are a greenish brown. There were two babies in the nest, big ones. In fact when I checked the nest later in the day they had left. But today, Friday, I saw the family in a cherry tree, the babies close and still calling their parents for food. They are the colour of the mother. I’m glad the family has decided to stay close.
I thought to go check the hummingbird nest. I disturbed an iguana in the hibiscus as I approached and he slipped into the river and swam below the surface with strong strokes for about 15 yards before raising his head and swimming periscope style further downstream. The water is a milky coffee brown just now after all the rain and has quite a current to it. The sand bank on the beach must have burst. One of the hummers was making a terrible racket and I thought it must be my presence, I couldn’t see any movement in the nest. I was wondering why she was not trying to distract me away from the nest when suddenly my eyes adjusted and I saw a good sized male basilisk sitting on the branch about 2 feet from her babies. She was darting at him and screaming furiously but he was paying no attention, though his crest was raised. I began to throw some pieces of dry stick at him but he ignored those too. Then I made a lucky throw and a piece hit him on the back – it wouldn’t have hurt, but it was enough to make him jump from the branch into the water and swim upstream. The hummer continued to buzz the area where he had been and it took a few moments for her to assure herself the threat was gone. I felt good, superhero style, but he knows where the nest is, I wonder if he’ll come back? She fed her young, a leaf was in the way so I couldn’t see how big they are, but last week they seemed to be a fair size, I hope they make it.