Costa Rica may be state-size but it still has regions! I mean this small country has unique places with its own ecological and cultural flavor. That’s a nice bonus for birding, especially in regions so close together.
After watching Great Green Macaws fly through the warm and humid air of the Caribbean lowlands, you can climb and refresh with tanagers, Collared Trogons, and more in the cool mountains.
Head to the southeastern part of Costa Rica and you can get your bird groove on with Purple-throated Fruitcrows, Snowy Cotingas, and a flock of toucans. Oh, and there’s also that ocean with its Caribbean waters, and a local culture strongly influenced by the descendants of Jamaica’s inhabitants.
i like it So do many other locals who visit the beaches south of Limon every weekend. You may encounter more people than expected but the birding is still exciting, there are still very good reasons to travel, especially in October.
These are some of our reasons and travel highlights this past weekend.
Costa Rica’s First American Flamingo
Whoah! With all those flamingos flying all the way to Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, it’s about time to show one off in Costa Rica! Heck, we’re not even that far from flamingo colonies in northern Colombia. The only thing is, those birds don’t normally fly this way. They are likely to divert to more appropriate areas, sites that are more suited to their hyper haline tastes.
I can’t fault the cool pink birds; they haven’t exactly evolved away from shallow water and salt pans. In Costa Rica, although we have a bunch of tropical habitats, we don’t have much for flamingos.
However, they may visit on rare occasions; some fishermen claim to have seen flamingos from time to time. I bet some have but nothing has been officially documented, at least not until last week!
First spotted on a beach near Moin, the pink star bird was found again by local birders in a roadside estuary south of Limon. When passing through the area, like a flamingo, I also stop at Estero Negro and other estuaries. These spots are no strangers to rare birds and often host something of feathery interest.
I also thought that they would be a good place to be very lucky with a flamingo but even then, my eyes had several birds flying, out into the ocean. They will be distant flamingos, to which you will exclaim in triumphant disbelief, “Holy crap! Flamingos!! There they are….” Birds that stop and stay for a while are too much for my flamingo dreams.
Fortunately, this pink mega proved my visions wrong. It did nothing but stay in the estuary and simply dip its serpentine neck in the “baleen” feed in the shallow water. Is it really a wild bird or one that escaped captivity? I’m not sure but either way, Costa Rica’s first flamingo has become a fantastic automatic ambassador for birding. It also has an easy job; just stand up, do some searching, and please stay alive.
The bird is also impossible to miss. On Friday morning, when our small contingent arrived from the Birding Club of Costa Rica, it was the first we saw and we were very pleased to enjoy the lingering, rosy views. Other people also watched it on Friday morning but not as many people on Sunday.
In the usual way people gather, someone has set up a food stall that looks like they have been selling grilled chicken since the year 2000. Cars are piled up on each side of the road, people are talking and laughing…Surprised me without cranking up some reggae or other loud, dance inspired tunes. I bet someone will do it later.
I mean, this flamingo shindig turns into a real party and most importantly, every person is there to see the bird (expect vendors). A few birders were there but there were waaay more non-birders and that was the best thing. Don’t get me wrong, I hope all birders see every bird but I also wish every non-birder will convert and become bonafide birders.
If you’re a non-birder reading this, don’t worry, you don’t have to run out the door to see a soaring hawk, you don’t have to grab a floppy hat or be decked out in bird decorations. You just need to see the beauty of birds and have some desire or idea to watch them in your backyard or further afield.
That’s my only question, I hope that flamingo does some natural marketing magic. It sure looks magical.
Wattled Jacana
Yes, there is another beautiful tropical bird in the area! The Wattled Jacana is not as wild and crazy as the flamingo but it is still a rare bird for Costa Rica. With exact digital hand instructions, we made the 60-minute drive from Cahuita to near Gandoca, near the border.
We had to wait a bit as we stared at a small, lush cow pasture but eventually, yes, it was there. Wattled Jacana and American Flamingo on the same day! What followed? Crowned Slaty-Flycatcher? Perhaps an extra large raptor. One can dream of an avian after all…
Many thanks to the local birders who found the bird. They showed us the exact spot and one even let us into his mom’s backyard for a better view! He should get a medal or a subscription or some other reward only.
Thousands of Swallows, Kingbirds, and Raptors (oh my!)
Flamingos weren’t the only reason for our weekend excursion. Oh, we’re there for the other birds too! You can’t go wrong in October in southeastern Costa Rica.
Migrants galore, sunnier weather than most months, and a nice large selection of resident species; I’ll take it!
I really like the swallow migration. This is out of the hands of bird migration madness. Go birding there in October and you’ll see an almost constant movement of swallows; mostly Barn, Cliff, and Bank. There are also other birds, especially the swallow-like ones, the Eastern Kingbird. Oh yes, they look like swallows, especially when flocks of hundreds mix and mingle in the air with the waves of swallows flying overhead.
On Sunday morning, to get an estimate of numbers, I counted swallows and kingbirds from one area for five minutes. Extrapolating from that, in two hours, I figured at least 1,600 Eastern Kingbirds flew along with at least 2,000 bank Swallows, and 6,000 each at Cliffs and Barns.
And honestly, those numbers are very conservative, I bet there are more. That only makes sense, most of the North American population of this species probably flies to Costa Rica.
Other migrants include Dickcissels, some Veerys to and from southern Brazil (where I fear climate-induced habitat destruction will seriously affect their survival), Prothonotary Warblers and a few other warblers, and many Traill’s and wood-pewees.
Oh yeah, all those raptors were there too- hundreds of TV and Broad-winged with the occasional Osprey, late Swallow-tailed Kite, Miss. Kites, Peregrines, Merlin clutching its hirundine prey, some Purple Martins and Chimney Swifts, some Common Nighthawks, and a few other birds.
If this were the 1930s, I’d probably say, “Wasn’t migration grand?”
Jay is black-chested
Black-breasted Jays are less common in Costa Rica. Around here, they reach the northern limit of their range, the edge of their ecological existence. This can make them a challenging bird to spot, especially in a short birding window.
Lucky for us, our window is in one of the best places to see the cool bird; Playa Negra, Cahuita. While birding near “Bridgette’s Place” (you can find it on Google), we found 8 of these birds with a good year.
Cahuita National Park
Southeastern Costa Rica has plenty of accessible accommodations but it’s still nice to be able to visit a national park. Now if they could open at 6 instead of the non-birdy 8, that would really help but on your hot walk, you’ll still see some birds.
We did really well in the parking lot with a few fruitcrows, a nice raptor migration, and a few migrants. Along the pleasant boardwalk trail, we also saw beautiful birdies such as Brown-capped Tyrannulet, Acadian Flycatcher, Checker-throated and White-flanked Antwrens, and were entertained by the constant calls of Black-crowned Antshrikes.
Peeking as I did in the marshy understory, I saw no Agami Herons or Rufescent Tiger-Herons. No Uniform Crakes calling either but still a good walk. If you do take that hike, remember it won’t look back. After 2.1 kilometers, you reach the beach (which is beautiful) and then you have to walk back the way you came.
Cahuita Street
This road is one of the few roads in the area that passes through beautiful forest. We only birded it one afternoon and it was pretty quiet but I would sure love to be there in the early morning!
Our best bird was a male Snowy Cotinga but many other species were possible and we also had a few tanagers, and various expected common rainforest birds. No Sulphur-rumped Tanagers but they should still be there. The black-crowned Antpitta may still occur, who knows what else?
Also known as the road to Casa Calateas, this is one of the hundreds of sites covered in my Costa Rica birding guide.
expensive
Yes, like so many places in Costa Rica and the globe in general, prices have risen in southeastern Costa Rica. Some restaurants are quite expensive and lodging is far from cheaper in the days.
However, there are many options, especially with Air BnB. If you’re flexible and look hard enough, you can find some great deals. The same goes for restaurants. Atlantida was great, especially for breakfast, and another place we really liked was Restaurant and Bar Peruanita. We tried to go to the acclaimed “Cahuita’s Taste Caribbean Soul Food” but they ran out of food! It’s a small place with homemade food, make sure to get there early.
As always, when visiting southeast Costa Rica, I wish we had stayed longer. When I leave that birdy zone, I drive because I know there are many underbirded areas to look at, sites that may host Great Jacamar and other rare species. Which migrant birds arrived after I left? Is there a Gray Kingbird nearby? Unusual and rare warblers frolicking in the forest? Flamingo or not, there are plenty of reasons to return.
