We are at the start of a three week trip around Costa Rica. Yesterday was a trip around the town seeing the sights so no real birding. Today was our first trip to do any proper wildlife spotting.
San Jose is a funny old town - very busy and bustling but a bit shabby. Most people use it as an overnight stop when heading out to the jungle, We added on an extra day as we had a bit more time so with jet-lag still getting us up early we headed off on a short walk to La Sabana park. This is the main municipal park of San Jose and is split between sports and picnic areas. By London standards it is pretty small. There is also a lake and a few wooded areas which apparently can hold some decent wildlife.
We got to the park about 8 with the sun starting to heat up the morning, out of a clear blue sky. There were lots of people already using the park for jogging and keep-fit. There were areas though which looked decent for birds.
The totally ubiquitous bird of here, and I suspect everywhere in CR, is the great-tailed grackle. This crow-like bird has a real attitude and there must have been many dozens if not a hundred or more strutting around in the park.
With many trees around it was hardly surprising that virtually the first birds we saw were woodpeckers. We actually saw two different sorts. The first was the smaller Hoffmann's, a classic "ladder-backed" bird.
Spring was in the air and there was much chasing around between birds of both sexes as territories and mating rights were established.
The second woodpecker we saw on a second afternoon visit. This is the much larger lineated woodpecker. It was vigorously excavating a hole in a dead tree, presumably as a nest chamber for later on. If so it should give some great views of the young being fed in a couple of months time.
Its breast should be white, so all this excavation was making it in sore need of a bath.
One of the other birds which were very much in evidence were the parakeets. We saw two different sorts, squeaking and flying around, mainly in the tops of the trees. The commonest was the crimson-fronted parakeet.
They are small to medium-sized parrots, with a bold crimson patch on their foreheads, a red epaulette-stripe on their shoulder and a long tail.
The second species was the orange-chinned parakeet.
They are much smaller, plainer, with an ivory-coloured beak, a large orbital ring and an orange spot under their lower mandible, which can be quite hard to spot.
Elsewhere in the wooded area, rufous-naped wrens were very much in evidence.
They are much larger than our wrens, probably chaffinch-sized birds, with a vey piratical-look to their heads. As I mentioned before, Spring is clearly in the air as one pair were demonstrating.
That crest in absolutely amazing.
There were a number of other birds we saw including red-billed pigeon,
white-winged dove,
Baltimore oriole, both male and female,
blue-grey tanager, which was a very common sight,
and the very common greater kiskadee.
There were a few smaller birds like this yellow warbler
and yellow-green vireo
but otherwise there weren't a lot of warblers and the like.
As well as a wooded area, there was a small lake, partially dried up and fringed with water hyacinth. It didn't look too inviting but there were about 50 black-bellied whistling ducks and a few pairs of Muscovy ducks paddling around on it.
On the edges of the lake a pair each of spotted sandpipers and killdeer were searching out invertebrates in the mud. One of the killdeer had a very narrow escape after three grackles chased it round the lake, presumably, bearing in mind their persistence, with the idea of having it for tea!
There were three species of herons, one each of great-blue heron,
great white egret and green heron. The green heron showed really well and displayed its curious throat.
It folds its gullet down into its neck so it can wind its neck on. When it yawns though this peculiar protuberance appears out its mouth!
An osprey fly had a fly round the lake twice searching out any easy prey. It never dived whilst we were there though.
Near the shore this rufous-collared sparrow, a bird we had shared breakfast with in our hotel dining room, was searching the grass for food.
Finally, I can't fail to mention the only mammal we saw, the variegated squirrel
They are a bit larger than out grey squirrels but have lovely multi-coloured coat. This can be, hence their name, quite variable in colour. They were real opportunists, trying on one occasion to solicit food from one of the vendors setting up shop to sell to the people in the park.
Add onto this list both black and turkey vulture, tropical kingbird, clay-coloured thrush and a few more and we got to 33 species by the end of the day. Not a bad haul for a small city-centre park. Tomorrow though we are off to Tortugeuro on the coast where we should see some really spectacular birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians and insects. Early start but should be well worth it.
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