Early morning of 2019/01/04 we've got Macaws (Scarlet - the only flavor for the trip) just outside. Audio only but quite unmistakable.
Original plan was to take the boat down the coast another hour to the Sirena Ranger Station 08°28'48.79" N 083°35'23.12" W - in Parque Nacional Corcovado proper. I've had queasy feelings about this one since weeks before the trip 'cause I'm pretty confident that I won't be surviving the hike through the rain forest that goes with it. HM at this point has reached a similar conclusion with respect to himself. We take it easy around the Lodge, arrange some guide time with Neyer for 14:00.
By 15:00 I start figuring we've had enough recovery time at that location and insist that phone communications be initiated to find out what the fuck's going on.
A taxi shows up to connect us with Neyer, guy takes us way the hell up the hill and into the jungle and stops - with nothing and nobody around anywhere. His English is about as good as our Spanish but I'm able to get him to call Emilio to find out what the fuck's going on NOW. Then cabbie takes us back down towards civilization and connects us with Neyer at his home. Fruit feeder setup with a nice view of Drake Bay beyond.
Good birds and it's nice being able to casually chat with someone with his depth of knowledge and experience. If you had your pick of one bird to score in Costa Rica - and probably the rest of the Neotropics - it would almost certainly be the Harpy Eagle. And they ARE present on the Osa Peninsula but you're probably gonna hafta be someone like Neyer to have ever scored. And he has on several occasions but with effort several thousand times beyond anything I could dream of mustering.
Neil Rettig's name is close to synonymous with Harpies - I met him at a falconry convention in the Seventies and see his name all the freakin' time in the credits at the ends of high quality wildlife programs on PBS. I ask Neyer if he knows him. "Yes." No further comment.
There's a pair of Macaws nesting nearby. One is parked in a tree and good light close behind us. Neyer educates us on these birds.
They're EXTREMELY cautious, secretive concerning the nesting cavity. They do careful checks for predators far out away from the nest before approaching and entering - one at a time with a big lag in between.
Crane Hawks are always watching for activity. If they find the cavity they reach in and it's all over. And I'm pretty sure he meant even with a parent inside. I know what an adult Macaw beak can do and I'd need a gun to my head before I'd start thinking about reaching into a cavity.
Sun gets low, about time to wrap things up. I'm stowing my scope and other toys on picnic table up top. Neyer and significant other wanna show us their flock of cute li'l piglets (destined to become sausage in a few months). OK. I go on down.
Then back up to finish packing up. Tripod case is secure - tripod and scope bagged and stowed, case zipped. Soft North Face backpack ISN'T. It's got four main zippered compartments and a dozen subcompartments. I don't do well with it on trips when I'm fatigued, stressed, rushed. All the fuckin' time in Alaska I'd reach some destination and discover that one or more compartments had been open or get lucky and have Xavier catch me early on in the game.
Before this trip I made a couple of vows. The fucking backpack wouldn't move six inches to anywhere without being fully zipped up and double checked and NOBODY was gonna RUSH me for ANY REASON and stay healthy for very long.
Rushing someone - it's taken me damn near all of my lifetime to realize - is a form of bullying. And I will NEVER AGAIN tolerate it.
I'd started getting my shit together on that latter issue on the Alaska trip immediately prior to our first excursion - in Nome - as I've previously written. Everybody else got a half hour to settle into rooms and prep for the outing. Our room wasn't ready and it took me awhile to figure out that it wasn't gonna BE ready and that I could just go in and prep in the half of the room that WAS ready without interfering with the housekeeper guy's progress.
Greg: "Ya think you can finish getting that scope equipment prepped in the van?"
Tad: "NO. I DON'T." (Motherfucker.)
Neyer says, "Here. Lemme bring that down for ya." Gee, thanks loads. Three backpack compartments wide open so now I gotta go back up the hill with both packages, check for dropped items en route and at the table, use the table to properly secure the backpack.
And while I'm doing that the taxi guy - the one who was set to drop and abandon us in the middle of the jaguar and chigger infested jungle several hours earlier - shows up.
And HM informs me that the taxi's here. (Yeah, thanks for letting me know. I'd have never realized that otherwise.) Again I get informed. (Are you sure? What color is it?) The third time I EXPLODE with a "SHUT (the fuck) UP!!! Loud enough to make sure he gets the message and leave my throat sore for two days (literally).
Well, I was getting vibes from Neyer that we were overstaying our welcome.
Tough fucking shit.
- WE'RE paying HIM.
- This is the motherfucker who:
-- killed an hour and a half apiece of our time this afternoon by not showing up when and where he was supposed to
-- had us kill five minutes saying hi to the sausage - interrupting my packing up exercise in the process
-- was way the fuck outta line "HELPING" me with my gear (giving me the bum's RUSH treatment)
P.S. Don't ever pull that kinda shit with me again.
Rushing. Pressures to move things along. That's led to a lot of hang glider launch situations. Upped the fatality rate a fair bit within the idiot hang checker and Aussie Methodist crowds over the decades.
P.S. Hi miguel, just noticed you got one in. Will do, thanks.
birds
-
Tad Eareckson
- Posts: 9161
- Joined: 2010/11/25 03:48:55 UTC
Re: birds
2019/01/05 is gonna be a LONG day. The scheduled water taxi pickup is 07:15 and we've gotta run up the Pacific Coast to Tarcoles, back east through the Central Valley and San Jose area to Turrialba, then SE a good stretch beyond to Rancho Naturalista - 09°49'55.07" N 083°33'49.73" W, 367 road kilometers, 3100 feet.
There's a mother, young adult daughter pair walking down from Vista Drake with us to catch the same boat. On the beach I let them play with the scope, they show me a pretty good quality video clip on the iPhone of a large red crested woodpecker they recently got at Monte Verde and ask for an ID. "Lineated." Then a minute or two later my brain starts kicking in. "Wait a minute. Show me that bird again." "Goddam! That's a PALE-BILLED! Same genus as our extinct Ivory-Bill! I'd kill to see that one." I end up not seeing one but it was still pretty cool just seeing a nice fresh one on their phone.
There's a fisherman cleaning his catch on the beach just up from us. He's totally swarmed by untold scores of Black Vultures.
I've decided that the boots drill for boarding the boat is too much of a pain. Not wearing socks. I'll just wade through, rinse the boots out with fresh water back at Sierpe, wear them until they're dried out. Ended up taking a day or so longer than I'd hoped but worked out well enough - and I never felt any discomfort.
We get back to the dock at Sierpe, I get myself and backpack disembarked. They're offloading the baggage from the bow compartment and I try to maneuver in to receive my tripod bags. But there's some goddam passenger boy scout who's taken it upon himself to receive everything. I see one of my bags emerging sooner than I was expecting and attempt to wiggle through the crowd to intercept. But the crowd's a little too thick and the bucket brigade's a little too fast for me.
Fuckin' boy scout takes the hand-off then decides to just drop it on the deck. Sickening thud when it hits - thick/heavy/scope end first. I wanna rip his goddam throat out. I evacuate it, clear the crowd, pull the scope out, sight through it. Seems to be OK - but I still wanna rip the stupid dickhead's throat out.
Happens that there's a guide-looking guy with my same Swarovski ATX 25x85 configuration right next to me. "Yeah, this bullshit happens all the time." If I ever find myself in a similar situation courtesy will be down the toilet until after I've finished plowing myself into a good enough position to make sure that bullshit doesn't happen again.
And now that I think of it - the goddam water taxi crew guy should've made sure that bullshit didn't happen. But these are probably the same assholes who are fine watching my Seattle buddy dumping his plastic garbage into the river on half a dozen rides a week.
Get organized, rinse out my boots, haul luggage to the car. Goddam! Started right up just fine with the key after two days of sitting idle! Major relief. Head back out towards Palmar Sur, go a few klicks up 223, pull over to properly organize and stow gear. Turn the key and...
Somebody tell me how that makes any sense whatsoever.
Get it roll started again, gas up just off the main drag and on the other side of the Rio Grande de Terraba. Guy helping us doesn't do English but he's able to find the release for the fuel flap (pull the tab behind and between the driver's ankles (if he's seated there at the time)) and I'm able to communicate to him via a few words in English which have gotta be familiar if not similar in Spanish and some pantomime why it might not be such a great idea to kill the engine - as per the usual custom.
On our way again, the coastal highway starts getting pretty idiot proof, turn the helm over to HM. Two things:
- don't stop it
- if you do stop it then don't stall it
Not far up the road is the Parque Nacional Marino Ballena - which is hot for Humpbacks and has this really cool natural sand peninsula formation known as the Uvita Whale Tail - 09°08'49.33" N 083°45'40.24" W - 'cause it looks exactly like a whale's tail. We'd both wanted to check it out en route and figured we had enough time to spare.
But the road started looking moderately scary shortly after leaving the main drag and then things got really scary. Narrow little drive with lotsa traffic that soon becomes choked with little tourism oriented businesses - surf, scuba, boats, fishing, tours. Let's get the fuck outta here NOW.
There's a gravel parking area that allows for a loop maneuver. Got it made, perfect, couldn't ask for better. And HM brings the car to a full stop then stalls it attempting to regain forward motion. Good thing I didn't also tell him to make sure not to run over any small children.
But it starts right back up with the key so he didn't actually do anything wrong worth mentioning.
Started seeing airborne Crested Caracaras and Black-Hawks - don't know whether they're Common, Great, both - on up the road. At one point a pair of Macaws flies low across just ahead of us. It was really cool just stumbling across them like that instead of getting them pointed out at known locations by local guides.
We get into a road construction backup or two. Finally figured out how to get Waze working so's we could tell what was going on in front of us.
We make the Central Valley. I've got the nav stuff and can usually figure out what the signs are saying what with standard shapes and colors and similarities in the languages. But we enter a long stretch of serious high speed highway on which everything's eastbound on all lanes - including the obvious normal westbound ones. Scared the crap outta me but eventually... When in Rome...
Getting through the thick choked urban stuff to the east of that highway was moderate hell but with the gadgets directing, immediately catching mistakes and recalculating... I shudder to think what it would've been like without them.
We get through, find ourselves back on some of the same roadway we used on our first full day in country including the Cachi Lake hydroelectric dam, reach goal with a fair bit o' daylight left to burn, get a brain dead easy roll-start parking position, settle in, look around, dinner...
Rancho Naturalista - a bit over 3100 feet - is another MAJOR birding operation and they're oozing with high powered guides. I think it was here that my Chinese Dragon caterpillar was immediately IDed from just my description as an Owl/Caligo Butterfly (as in Naturalist Journeys / Caligo Ventures). Lotsa guests who have their shit together pretty well too.
Group meals with hour long windows starting at set times - they ring a bell to signal everybody. They're fun for exchanging war stories, finding out what everyone got and didn't.
Fruit feeders out back at ground level, hummer feeders (the usual inverted bottle junk) all over the veranda upstairs. Sign in the latter area requesting that feeders not be unhooked or moved. They've seen my kind before. (But I don't know what they think they're accomplishing with that rule.)
There's a mother, young adult daughter pair walking down from Vista Drake with us to catch the same boat. On the beach I let them play with the scope, they show me a pretty good quality video clip on the iPhone of a large red crested woodpecker they recently got at Monte Verde and ask for an ID. "Lineated." Then a minute or two later my brain starts kicking in. "Wait a minute. Show me that bird again." "Goddam! That's a PALE-BILLED! Same genus as our extinct Ivory-Bill! I'd kill to see that one." I end up not seeing one but it was still pretty cool just seeing a nice fresh one on their phone.
There's a fisherman cleaning his catch on the beach just up from us. He's totally swarmed by untold scores of Black Vultures.
I've decided that the boots drill for boarding the boat is too much of a pain. Not wearing socks. I'll just wade through, rinse the boots out with fresh water back at Sierpe, wear them until they're dried out. Ended up taking a day or so longer than I'd hoped but worked out well enough - and I never felt any discomfort.
We get back to the dock at Sierpe, I get myself and backpack disembarked. They're offloading the baggage from the bow compartment and I try to maneuver in to receive my tripod bags. But there's some goddam passenger boy scout who's taken it upon himself to receive everything. I see one of my bags emerging sooner than I was expecting and attempt to wiggle through the crowd to intercept. But the crowd's a little too thick and the bucket brigade's a little too fast for me.
Fuckin' boy scout takes the hand-off then decides to just drop it on the deck. Sickening thud when it hits - thick/heavy/scope end first. I wanna rip his goddam throat out. I evacuate it, clear the crowd, pull the scope out, sight through it. Seems to be OK - but I still wanna rip the stupid dickhead's throat out.
Happens that there's a guide-looking guy with my same Swarovski ATX 25x85 configuration right next to me. "Yeah, this bullshit happens all the time." If I ever find myself in a similar situation courtesy will be down the toilet until after I've finished plowing myself into a good enough position to make sure that bullshit doesn't happen again.
And now that I think of it - the goddam water taxi crew guy should've made sure that bullshit didn't happen. But these are probably the same assholes who are fine watching my Seattle buddy dumping his plastic garbage into the river on half a dozen rides a week.
Get organized, rinse out my boots, haul luggage to the car. Goddam! Started right up just fine with the key after two days of sitting idle! Major relief. Head back out towards Palmar Sur, go a few klicks up 223, pull over to properly organize and stow gear. Turn the key and...
Somebody tell me how that makes any sense whatsoever.
Get it roll started again, gas up just off the main drag and on the other side of the Rio Grande de Terraba. Guy helping us doesn't do English but he's able to find the release for the fuel flap (pull the tab behind and between the driver's ankles (if he's seated there at the time)) and I'm able to communicate to him via a few words in English which have gotta be familiar if not similar in Spanish and some pantomime why it might not be such a great idea to kill the engine - as per the usual custom.
On our way again, the coastal highway starts getting pretty idiot proof, turn the helm over to HM. Two things:
- don't stop it
- if you do stop it then don't stall it
Not far up the road is the Parque Nacional Marino Ballena - which is hot for Humpbacks and has this really cool natural sand peninsula formation known as the Uvita Whale Tail - 09°08'49.33" N 083°45'40.24" W - 'cause it looks exactly like a whale's tail. We'd both wanted to check it out en route and figured we had enough time to spare.
But the road started looking moderately scary shortly after leaving the main drag and then things got really scary. Narrow little drive with lotsa traffic that soon becomes choked with little tourism oriented businesses - surf, scuba, boats, fishing, tours. Let's get the fuck outta here NOW.
There's a gravel parking area that allows for a loop maneuver. Got it made, perfect, couldn't ask for better. And HM brings the car to a full stop then stalls it attempting to regain forward motion. Good thing I didn't also tell him to make sure not to run over any small children.
But it starts right back up with the key so he didn't actually do anything wrong worth mentioning.
Started seeing airborne Crested Caracaras and Black-Hawks - don't know whether they're Common, Great, both - on up the road. At one point a pair of Macaws flies low across just ahead of us. It was really cool just stumbling across them like that instead of getting them pointed out at known locations by local guides.
We get into a road construction backup or two. Finally figured out how to get Waze working so's we could tell what was going on in front of us.
We make the Central Valley. I've got the nav stuff and can usually figure out what the signs are saying what with standard shapes and colors and similarities in the languages. But we enter a long stretch of serious high speed highway on which everything's eastbound on all lanes - including the obvious normal westbound ones. Scared the crap outta me but eventually... When in Rome...
Getting through the thick choked urban stuff to the east of that highway was moderate hell but with the gadgets directing, immediately catching mistakes and recalculating... I shudder to think what it would've been like without them.
We get through, find ourselves back on some of the same roadway we used on our first full day in country including the Cachi Lake hydroelectric dam, reach goal with a fair bit o' daylight left to burn, get a brain dead easy roll-start parking position, settle in, look around, dinner...
Rancho Naturalista - a bit over 3100 feet - is another MAJOR birding operation and they're oozing with high powered guides. I think it was here that my Chinese Dragon caterpillar was immediately IDed from just my description as an Owl/Caligo Butterfly (as in Naturalist Journeys / Caligo Ventures). Lotsa guests who have their shit together pretty well too.
Group meals with hour long windows starting at set times - they ring a bell to signal everybody. They're fun for exchanging war stories, finding out what everyone got and didn't.
Fruit feeders out back at ground level, hummer feeders (the usual inverted bottle junk) all over the veranda upstairs. Sign in the latter area requesting that feeders not be unhooked or moved. They've seen my kind before. (But I don't know what they think they're accomplishing with that rule.)
-
Tad Eareckson
- Posts: 9161
- Joined: 2010/11/25 03:48:55 UTC
Re: birds
2019/01/06 I am NOT out on the trail bright and early (big surprise). Breakfast then a short walk up the hill to catch up with HM and our guide at the moth/insect light area.
http://ranchonaturalista.net/other-activities/
Rancho Naturalista
Speaking of which... It's kinda late when we're sitting there - zero insects on the sheet - but a Coati (White-Nosed in that part of the hemisphere - from the US southwest (and maybe an introduced breeding population in Florida) down through Central America and into a wee bit of Columbia) stumbles upon us. At first I think that he isn't the least bit concerned with our presence but then there's a minor oops reaction and he exits at a mildly increased pace.
Save for a somewhat distant pack of them crossing the road in front of us in Belize this is the first I've seen in the wild and on the hoof. (Bodies of dead ones on the sides of roads common enough though.)
Relocate to back down the entrance road a bit where pastures open up views to valleys, slopes, ridges all directions around us save for north. Good excuse to play with the scope.
There's a Montezuma Oropendola colony with a healthy contingent of Giant Cowbirds working on parasitizing the nests at reasonably close range to the south, no shortage of vultures working the early day lift most places you wanna look. The 11161 and 10958 foot peaks of Volcáns Irazú and Turrialba respectively are just across the Central Valley from us but stratus clouds shroud their tops and much more way more often than not. First and second highest volcanos in the country, both active.
We relocate to the owner's family's residence a bit NW of and substantially downhill from the lodge. They've got a pretty healthy forest of vervain which is keeping the hummers busy. That soon gets us the Snowcap - which is the really cool tiny little hummer that Rancho Naturalista uses for its logo. Uncommon, very restricted range and specialized habitat. If you want one you pretty much need to book a stay at Rancho Naturalista.
After lunch crash at the hummer feeders upstairs. Got my:
http://www.duncraft.com/HUM-Drum
HUM-Drum, Hand Held Hummingbird Feeders Made & Handcrafted in the USA
with me and the veranda offers a nice shot at the ground level fruit feeders below.
Agoutis (Central American - Dasyprocta punctata) put in appearances.
As usual the fuckin' hummers have way too many choices but I'm still able to score an occasional landing. Another guest wants in on the action and I hand my toy over and give her a couple tips. She also manages a few scores.
I know I'm violating the spirit of their feeder law and start off a little secretive about what I'm doing. But after I've gotten a few landings under my belt I don't much care. Daughter of the owner stops by, sees the action, asks if she can do anything to help. "Yeah. Take your sign down." Gets a laugh but not the hoped for result.
One of the coolest memories I have from the trip...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/artour_a/334726447/
And I'd say the species I found on a wooden 4x4 pillar of the veranda was a fair bit cooler than the one in the photo. Thorax plate was more angular and wings case covering the abdomen was broader/rounder.
Note that on these shield/hooded/leaf mantises the head moves freely of the plate which extends over it.
I heard it had been previously detained on the lower level. And after we finished looking at and playing with it on our deck I put it back where I'd found it. Nope. WAY too conspicuous. This is NOT what you're adapted for.
Off of and below the north/right end of the veranda is the top of a fifteen foot tree one of the geeks later IDs for me as something in the nightshade family. I lie down on the deck and do the necessary painful contortions to get an arm through the railing such that my hand is positioned safely over the top center. Bombs away... Bull's-eye!
The broad leaves are growing out in something of a radial pattern and the color and texture are PERFECT matches. My bug almost immediately orients herself in the pattern head dead center, body radiating outboard - and becomes totally invisible in plain view.
I have people come over and look. She's top center six feet straight down from eyes level and position, I describe and point to the position, it takes everybody five minutes apiece to find her. And when they finally do the reaction is always "OH!!!"
Next morning the goddam thing's still there in the exact same position.
At dinner we're talkin' snakes and I'm talking about getting my solar eclipse rattler in the bag to make sure it doesn't get decapitated. A guide - from England as I recall - overhears some fragments and thinks the discussion is about accomplishing the opposite. Gets straightened out, says he has zilch experience with snakes, asks me how I manage to safely let go when the time comes.
Exactly what my nephew had asked me when we were prepping for the rattler operation. Give him the same answer. Ya just quickly let go, withdraw, let him drop into the bag.
It's the point of the operation when I'm LEAST concerned about anything unpleasant happening and something I've never even thought about.
The better answer... They're NOT TRYING to ESCALATE the conflict. They're just trying to SURVIVE the encounter and escape to safe or at least defensible cover. For just about every carnivore or omnivore bigger than they are they're protein - and they're gonna jump on any ghost of a chance they get to withdraw.
I keep finding references to Fer-De-Lances being "aggressive". Somebody find me a video documenting one as actually being aggressive. Very little problem doing that with humans though. And now that I think of it... Somebody find me a video documenting a Fer-De-Lance discarding plastic candy wrappers in the Sierpe River.
http://ranchonaturalista.net/other-activities/
Rancho Naturalista
Yeah. Let's fuck over the insects for the benefit of the viewing convenience of our guests - 'cause no one really gives a rat's ass about the lives of bugs. Not to mention the energy consumption and light pollution issues. A little patch of the woods with a roof and a vertically hung white sheet. I DO NOT LIKE the concept. And I'm not alone in this sentiment - I've heard that one of the guides boycotts the operation.Butterflies and Moths
When guests are present at Rancho Naturalista we usually turn on the moth/insect light so that they can observe the amazing amount of insects and moths that are attracted to the light. There are around 12,000 species of moths found in Costa Rica so you can imagine the sizable amount that arrive at the light, not to mention the insects. The darkest nights are best for insects and moths at the light, so the new moon nights are the best time. Rain also helps to speed up the breeding cycles of butterflies, moths, and insects, so the rainy season is best. If the light is left on all night, insect feeding birds arrive at dawn to feed on the insects and moths. You may see the Red-throated Ant Tanager, Rufous Motmot, Tawny-chested Flycatcher, White-breasted Wood Wren, and several species of Woodcreeper and other species in the area near the light. If you want the moth light to be connected please just ask and we will be happy to turn it on!
But that's not exactly what y'all are doing with this. This is a bit like framing a panel of plate glass behind a fruit feeder so's your patrons can watch the Coati's and Peccaries come in and feed on the stunned tanagers and honeycreepers.We do have a "No Collection" policy at Rancho Naturalista, remember "Take only pictures and leave only footprints"
Speaking of which... It's kinda late when we're sitting there - zero insects on the sheet - but a Coati (White-Nosed in that part of the hemisphere - from the US southwest (and maybe an introduced breeding population in Florida) down through Central America and into a wee bit of Columbia) stumbles upon us. At first I think that he isn't the least bit concerned with our presence but then there's a minor oops reaction and he exits at a mildly increased pace.
Save for a somewhat distant pack of them crossing the road in front of us in Belize this is the first I've seen in the wild and on the hoof. (Bodies of dead ones on the sides of roads common enough though.)
Relocate to back down the entrance road a bit where pastures open up views to valleys, slopes, ridges all directions around us save for north. Good excuse to play with the scope.
There's a Montezuma Oropendola colony with a healthy contingent of Giant Cowbirds working on parasitizing the nests at reasonably close range to the south, no shortage of vultures working the early day lift most places you wanna look. The 11161 and 10958 foot peaks of Volcáns Irazú and Turrialba respectively are just across the Central Valley from us but stratus clouds shroud their tops and much more way more often than not. First and second highest volcanos in the country, both active.
We relocate to the owner's family's residence a bit NW of and substantially downhill from the lodge. They've got a pretty healthy forest of vervain which is keeping the hummers busy. That soon gets us the Snowcap - which is the really cool tiny little hummer that Rancho Naturalista uses for its logo. Uncommon, very restricted range and specialized habitat. If you want one you pretty much need to book a stay at Rancho Naturalista.
After lunch crash at the hummer feeders upstairs. Got my:
http://www.duncraft.com/HUM-Drum
HUM-Drum, Hand Held Hummingbird Feeders Made & Handcrafted in the USA
with me and the veranda offers a nice shot at the ground level fruit feeders below.
Agoutis (Central American - Dasyprocta punctata) put in appearances.
As usual the fuckin' hummers have way too many choices but I'm still able to score an occasional landing. Another guest wants in on the action and I hand my toy over and give her a couple tips. She also manages a few scores.
I know I'm violating the spirit of their feeder law and start off a little secretive about what I'm doing. But after I've gotten a few landings under my belt I don't much care. Daughter of the owner stops by, sees the action, asks if she can do anything to help. "Yeah. Take your sign down." Gets a laugh but not the hoped for result.
One of the coolest memories I have from the trip...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/artour_a/334726447/
And I'd say the species I found on a wooden 4x4 pillar of the veranda was a fair bit cooler than the one in the photo. Thorax plate was more angular and wings case covering the abdomen was broader/rounder.
Note that on these shield/hooded/leaf mantises the head moves freely of the plate which extends over it.
I heard it had been previously detained on the lower level. And after we finished looking at and playing with it on our deck I put it back where I'd found it. Nope. WAY too conspicuous. This is NOT what you're adapted for.
Off of and below the north/right end of the veranda is the top of a fifteen foot tree one of the geeks later IDs for me as something in the nightshade family. I lie down on the deck and do the necessary painful contortions to get an arm through the railing such that my hand is positioned safely over the top center. Bombs away... Bull's-eye!
The broad leaves are growing out in something of a radial pattern and the color and texture are PERFECT matches. My bug almost immediately orients herself in the pattern head dead center, body radiating outboard - and becomes totally invisible in plain view.
I have people come over and look. She's top center six feet straight down from eyes level and position, I describe and point to the position, it takes everybody five minutes apiece to find her. And when they finally do the reaction is always "OH!!!"
Next morning the goddam thing's still there in the exact same position.
At dinner we're talkin' snakes and I'm talking about getting my solar eclipse rattler in the bag to make sure it doesn't get decapitated. A guide - from England as I recall - overhears some fragments and thinks the discussion is about accomplishing the opposite. Gets straightened out, says he has zilch experience with snakes, asks me how I manage to safely let go when the time comes.
Exactly what my nephew had asked me when we were prepping for the rattler operation. Give him the same answer. Ya just quickly let go, withdraw, let him drop into the bag.
It's the point of the operation when I'm LEAST concerned about anything unpleasant happening and something I've never even thought about.
The better answer... They're NOT TRYING to ESCALATE the conflict. They're just trying to SURVIVE the encounter and escape to safe or at least defensible cover. For just about every carnivore or omnivore bigger than they are they're protein - and they're gonna jump on any ghost of a chance they get to withdraw.
I keep finding references to Fer-De-Lances being "aggressive". Somebody find me a video documenting one as actually being aggressive. Very little problem doing that with humans though. And now that I think of it... Somebody find me a video documenting a Fer-De-Lance discarding plastic candy wrappers in the Sierpe River.
-
Tad Eareckson
- Posts: 9161
- Joined: 2010/11/25 03:48:55 UTC
Re: birds
2019/01/07 I'm again not out on the trail bright and early. HM makes it to the moth/insect slaughter installation and scores a nice helping of some of the advertised specialty birds.
Breakfast, pack up, load, roll, 154 klicks to Playa Negra Guesthouse on the other coast just up the beach from Cahuita. Run by Pierre and Marise from Quebec - another situation in which my high school foreign language education might not prove largely useless.
Pretty flat run along the Caribbean but I find a situation close by on the beach road that'll allow me to get it started.
Marise is checking us in, I hear something loud not far off in the inland direction. "Was that a DOG?" "No, Howler Monkey." "Yeah, that's what I was thinking. But this location seemed a bit too civilized." Apparently not.
The Guesthouse is a compound - securely walled and gated off. You need/get keys to walk into the lodgings area / drive into the (flat) parking lot. Won't be using gravity to get started for the next leg of the trip.
Takes us back (way back) to our cottage. Points out the Green Black Poison Arrow Frogs sheltering in the base of the impenetrable hedging to the right of the walkway at the NW edge of the property. Big unexpected plus for me.
Very comfortable and spacious accommodations. Retrieve the car, park it as optimally as possible, retrieve the luggage. No feeders on the property but enough nice treetop and garden stuff around to pull in the feathers, keep supplying us with binocular targets accessible from the veranda.
As the light starts fading a House Gecko appears just below the edge of the ceiling above us. Really obvious 'cause everything 'cept the wall behind us is painted glossy white. And then not many seconds later another. And then in less time than it takes to describe it the area's totally oozing with geckos of all sizes. And I'm thinking, "Wow. That's one helluva lot of predator biomass concentration for such a sterile looking little environment."
Dinner 150 yards up the road at the Reggae Bar.
2019/01/08 breakfast at Brigitte's eighty yards behind the Reggae Bar but accessed through a straightish line path by the tourist horses corral. I used to be able to ride those things fairly well but figure that on this trip the necessary exertion would kill me five times faster than walking would - 'specially on steep and/or rough terrain.
Can remember virtually nothing of the day. Didn't drive anywhere 'cause getting the car started was almost certainly gonna be a substantial group effort. Walked to an access of the Playa Negra, verified that it was indeed a Black Beach, sorted and reorganized gear, recovered some, watched the grounds for birds and butterflies...
Gecko time again arrives. The porch lights are on. Maybe they get switched on by a photosensor or maybe HM switched them on to be able to read the field guide. But I think they:
- were off the previous evening
- are normally on when the cottage is unoccupied to help light up the compound
Then I see a large moth fluttering against the ceiling and a gecko moving in for the kill.
Lightbulb! (Figurative sense.) This is an accidental iteration of the Rancho Naturalista moth/insect light. Lights, white ceiling instead of sheet. That's how come we have thirty pounds of gecko biomass packed into a territory of a couple hundred square feet of sterile moonscape "habitat". That's not a fair fight. And I jump up to switch off the lights.
Doesn't make any difference though. The ceiling is still the brightest thing available - open sky to the moth. And the only safe option the moth knows is to try to climb to safety in it.
Oh well, at least with the lights off we won't be pulling ten thousand times the number of victims into the death trap.
Breakfast, pack up, load, roll, 154 klicks to Playa Negra Guesthouse on the other coast just up the beach from Cahuita. Run by Pierre and Marise from Quebec - another situation in which my high school foreign language education might not prove largely useless.
Pretty flat run along the Caribbean but I find a situation close by on the beach road that'll allow me to get it started.
Marise is checking us in, I hear something loud not far off in the inland direction. "Was that a DOG?" "No, Howler Monkey." "Yeah, that's what I was thinking. But this location seemed a bit too civilized." Apparently not.
The Guesthouse is a compound - securely walled and gated off. You need/get keys to walk into the lodgings area / drive into the (flat) parking lot. Won't be using gravity to get started for the next leg of the trip.
Takes us back (way back) to our cottage. Points out the Green Black Poison Arrow Frogs sheltering in the base of the impenetrable hedging to the right of the walkway at the NW edge of the property. Big unexpected plus for me.
Very comfortable and spacious accommodations. Retrieve the car, park it as optimally as possible, retrieve the luggage. No feeders on the property but enough nice treetop and garden stuff around to pull in the feathers, keep supplying us with binocular targets accessible from the veranda.
As the light starts fading a House Gecko appears just below the edge of the ceiling above us. Really obvious 'cause everything 'cept the wall behind us is painted glossy white. And then not many seconds later another. And then in less time than it takes to describe it the area's totally oozing with geckos of all sizes. And I'm thinking, "Wow. That's one helluva lot of predator biomass concentration for such a sterile looking little environment."
Dinner 150 yards up the road at the Reggae Bar.
2019/01/08 breakfast at Brigitte's eighty yards behind the Reggae Bar but accessed through a straightish line path by the tourist horses corral. I used to be able to ride those things fairly well but figure that on this trip the necessary exertion would kill me five times faster than walking would - 'specially on steep and/or rough terrain.
Can remember virtually nothing of the day. Didn't drive anywhere 'cause getting the car started was almost certainly gonna be a substantial group effort. Walked to an access of the Playa Negra, verified that it was indeed a Black Beach, sorted and reorganized gear, recovered some, watched the grounds for birds and butterflies...
Gecko time again arrives. The porch lights are on. Maybe they get switched on by a photosensor or maybe HM switched them on to be able to read the field guide. But I think they:
- were off the previous evening
- are normally on when the cottage is unoccupied to help light up the compound
Then I see a large moth fluttering against the ceiling and a gecko moving in for the kill.
Lightbulb! (Figurative sense.) This is an accidental iteration of the Rancho Naturalista moth/insect light. Lights, white ceiling instead of sheet. That's how come we have thirty pounds of gecko biomass packed into a territory of a couple hundred square feet of sterile moonscape "habitat". That's not a fair fight. And I jump up to switch off the lights.
Doesn't make any difference though. The ceiling is still the brightest thing available - open sky to the moth. And the only safe option the moth knows is to try to climb to safety in it.
Oh well, at least with the lights off we won't be pulling ten thousand times the number of victims into the death trap.
-
Tad Eareckson
- Posts: 9161
- Joined: 2010/11/25 03:48:55 UTC
Re: birds
2019/01/09 regain consciousness early enough, go to the bathroom for my electric toothbrush - which has been living in the far right corner of the sink counter. Not there. Go back to my bedroom, look around, start going through things. Can't find. Also notice that I can't find my binocular.
Start going into panic mode - tearing things apart looking:
- under beds
- in places I:
-- couldn't possible have put them
-- places I've already searched three times before
They hafta have been stolen (by somebody with a key) while we were out for dinner at the Reggae Bar again last evening. (Yeah, right. My electric toothbrush AND my stabilized Canon 10x42s. That makes a lotta sense.)
Heart's pounding, adrenaline's pumping, total panic mode. These are both bulky enough items that they can't possibly be missed in a search like this. Go out to the car neither of us has touched since arrival. This stuff's been STOLEN.
Get HM to push an intercom button at the office which gets Marise. Back in the room I tear open a pair of louvered doors in my bedroom. And guess what I see on the shelves along with a couple other items I'd staged last evening in preparation for bugging out in the morning.
OH SHIT!!! I feel like such a TOTAL MORON and go charging up to the office area, intercept Marise, call off the alarm, apologize my ass off. And she was SO KIND and FORGIVING. Just expresses relief that I still have my stuff.
I had torn apart every cubic inch of everything I could think of and HADN'T EVEN SEEN THE FUCKING DOORS in the middle of the wall in my bedroom.
2019/01/05 when settling into and exploring the room at Rancho Naturalista I'd found a door that looked like it probably accessed an adjacent room - the way motels often have for large families/parties. I was curious though and what's the harm in trying the door? If it accesses another room it's gonna be locked whether or not it's occupied. Right?
Oops! SORRY!!! Click. So my brain's been wired to be real careful about opening doors in lodgings. And on that morning my brain has these doors logged as being an access to HM's bedroom. They've become invisible - indistinguishable from the rest of the wall. And as I descend into total panic mode the wall becomes solid steel.
(And yes, an extra brain and pair of eye WOULD have been a major benefit in this situation. However...)
Breakfast back at Brigitte's, load up the car. On my last run out from the cottage there's a Poison Arrow Frog eight inches out from cover. I bobbled him a few times but he made it back into his impenetrable cover before I could score him as a legitimate catch.
Two of us can't start the car, I push it back into starting position, call for reinforcements. Thanks zillions, sorry again, bye.
HM needs an ATM, drive SE a klick into Cahuita, dump him off, drift around the streets a couple minutes, pick him up, head NE.
Next stop is Selva Bananito Lodge, 42 klicks from the Guesthouse. But a good chunk of the latter of those are gonna be very interesting - and a lot more interesting than I'd been assuming. And the general rule is that the deeper in we go the more interesting it gets.
Our destination's at only about 270 feet but still we're gonna encounter some really steep - if fairly short - climbs as we close in. I know we had Garmin and I'm pretty sure we had Waze working but the mapping as we got deeper in wasn't all that great.
Gas gauge I remember as reading maybe a bit under a quarter tank at Playa Negra but seems to be getting low fast and I've started wishing we'd tanked up in Cahuita. The light comes on at one point but I think that was an consequence of steep pitch attitudes as it doesn't stay on for long. I know they'll have a tractor and other such equipment so if we make it in we'll be able to get a gallon or two to make sure we'll be able to safely reach Limon (major population center) after departure.
Road's dirt, areas are steep and wet, I switch to four-wheel mode and am happy to have it.
We cross a small stream and I see a little brown lizard. I think Basilisk and damn! The little guy runs away across the stream surface! First one since Belize, got and IDed him own my own!
In a fairly open hilly stretch I get a real cool little bird - Snowy Cotinga. Reminds me of our White Hawks in Belize. White birds in forest habitats - seem so out of place. They belong on oceans, lakes, beaches, marshes, tundra.
We've gotta drive through the Bananito River to make it to goal. I've been looking forward to this part. Also dreading it 'cause I don't know what:
- to expect
- anything about go / no go depth figures
Reach it and it's a lovely stone bottom and depth appears uniform and totally doable but - goddam - there are both up- and downstream exit options. I stop, get out of the car with the glasses, note fresh tire tracks on the downstreamer.
And shortly thereafter reach goal without incident.
Harvey (Anselmo Harriett Harriett) who will be our guide is busy trimming back the jungle when we arrive and gets me parked in another brain dead easy situation, confirms that a couple gallons will be no problem, gets us checked into our cabin close to the top point of the lodge complex area terrain a bit beyond the car. Cabin veranda affords a nice commanding view of some mostly open pasture area sloping a bit down away to the east.
Electricity is solar, cabins get just enough for adequate lighting after the sun goes down, but ya don't wanna squander it 'cause things aren't gonna improve until the sun gets back up again. The main/central building - kitchen, dining, meeting - is juiced up better and they have a charging station for laptops and gadgets.
In the early afternoon we're on the veranda and there's a rather small bird on a branch fairly close in and a bit below our level. I don't think it's gonna prove to be anything very interesting but... "Goddam! That's a TROGON!" Gartered it turns out after checking the field guide.
Harvey takes us south down a drive a couple hundred yards to a pond for some productive birding. First Jacanas for the trip.
We bail, return to the top, beat the bushes around the cabins for a bit, the excursion starts moving down into the pasture area to the east. What the hell, I'll grab the scope. And in short order Harvey scores us a really easy pair of Keel-Billed Toucans. And I've got my scope.
Sure makes up bigtime for those crappy fleeting glances I got of my only previous in Belize. Stunning views of two stunning birds for as long as we cared to stay and look. (Doesn't make up for that shit Roodal did to me in Trinidad with my Groove-Bills however.)
Call it a day, back to the cabin, comfortable dinner back at central with other guests and a few staffers, back to the cabin.
Earlier in the day I'd noticed that the toilet wasn't entirely kicking off after the tank refilled. I'd pulled the lid and played with internal stuff a little but gotten nowhere. Normally I'd have just closed the shut-off valve but there wasn't anything anywhere inside the cabin. Had meant to say something about it but had gotten too overwhelmed by all the stuff going on.
HM flushes and things start going Katrina. I try to tighten a connection but it falls apart and now I've got this little plastic fire hose blasting away full tilt. These cabins are raised, you can walk underneath them, there's gotta be an accessible cutoff valve below but it got solid dark a couple hours ago and I'm not optimistic about being able to find it. And I found I was able to mitigate things a real good bit by aiming my fire hose at a grated drain in the floor. Tell HM to get down the hill and notify Houston that we had a problem.
Cavalry returns with lights and tools and are able staunch the flow in reasonable short order. The cabin's become something of a swamp, they evacuate us and our belongings, gear to the one on the other side of the drive. Then they clear out of the disaster area way sooner than I'd expected and I worry that I lot of unnecessary damage is gonna be done to the wooden floor and furniture. I go back up with a flashlight and, yeah, it's still a major swamp. But it's not really my problem and I don't have enough energy reserves left to try to do anything more anyway.
---
Edit:
- 2019/02/13 22:15:00 UTC
- 2019/02/17 17:30:00 UTC
Start going into panic mode - tearing things apart looking:
- under beds
- in places I:
-- couldn't possible have put them
-- places I've already searched three times before
They hafta have been stolen (by somebody with a key) while we were out for dinner at the Reggae Bar again last evening. (Yeah, right. My electric toothbrush AND my stabilized Canon 10x42s. That makes a lotta sense.)
Heart's pounding, adrenaline's pumping, total panic mode. These are both bulky enough items that they can't possibly be missed in a search like this. Go out to the car neither of us has touched since arrival. This stuff's been STOLEN.
Get HM to push an intercom button at the office which gets Marise. Back in the room I tear open a pair of louvered doors in my bedroom. And guess what I see on the shelves along with a couple other items I'd staged last evening in preparation for bugging out in the morning.
OH SHIT!!! I feel like such a TOTAL MORON and go charging up to the office area, intercept Marise, call off the alarm, apologize my ass off. And she was SO KIND and FORGIVING. Just expresses relief that I still have my stuff.
I had torn apart every cubic inch of everything I could think of and HADN'T EVEN SEEN THE FUCKING DOORS in the middle of the wall in my bedroom.
2019/01/05 when settling into and exploring the room at Rancho Naturalista I'd found a door that looked like it probably accessed an adjacent room - the way motels often have for large families/parties. I was curious though and what's the harm in trying the door? If it accesses another room it's gonna be locked whether or not it's occupied. Right?
Oops! SORRY!!! Click. So my brain's been wired to be real careful about opening doors in lodgings. And on that morning my brain has these doors logged as being an access to HM's bedroom. They've become invisible - indistinguishable from the rest of the wall. And as I descend into total panic mode the wall becomes solid steel.
(And yes, an extra brain and pair of eye WOULD have been a major benefit in this situation. However...)
Breakfast back at Brigitte's, load up the car. On my last run out from the cottage there's a Poison Arrow Frog eight inches out from cover. I bobbled him a few times but he made it back into his impenetrable cover before I could score him as a legitimate catch.
Two of us can't start the car, I push it back into starting position, call for reinforcements. Thanks zillions, sorry again, bye.
HM needs an ATM, drive SE a klick into Cahuita, dump him off, drift around the streets a couple minutes, pick him up, head NE.
Next stop is Selva Bananito Lodge, 42 klicks from the Guesthouse. But a good chunk of the latter of those are gonna be very interesting - and a lot more interesting than I'd been assuming. And the general rule is that the deeper in we go the more interesting it gets.
Our destination's at only about 270 feet but still we're gonna encounter some really steep - if fairly short - climbs as we close in. I know we had Garmin and I'm pretty sure we had Waze working but the mapping as we got deeper in wasn't all that great.
Gas gauge I remember as reading maybe a bit under a quarter tank at Playa Negra but seems to be getting low fast and I've started wishing we'd tanked up in Cahuita. The light comes on at one point but I think that was an consequence of steep pitch attitudes as it doesn't stay on for long. I know they'll have a tractor and other such equipment so if we make it in we'll be able to get a gallon or two to make sure we'll be able to safely reach Limon (major population center) after departure.
Road's dirt, areas are steep and wet, I switch to four-wheel mode and am happy to have it.
We cross a small stream and I see a little brown lizard. I think Basilisk and damn! The little guy runs away across the stream surface! First one since Belize, got and IDed him own my own!
In a fairly open hilly stretch I get a real cool little bird - Snowy Cotinga. Reminds me of our White Hawks in Belize. White birds in forest habitats - seem so out of place. They belong on oceans, lakes, beaches, marshes, tundra.
We've gotta drive through the Bananito River to make it to goal. I've been looking forward to this part. Also dreading it 'cause I don't know what:
- to expect
- anything about go / no go depth figures
Reach it and it's a lovely stone bottom and depth appears uniform and totally doable but - goddam - there are both up- and downstream exit options. I stop, get out of the car with the glasses, note fresh tire tracks on the downstreamer.
And shortly thereafter reach goal without incident.
Harvey (Anselmo Harriett Harriett) who will be our guide is busy trimming back the jungle when we arrive and gets me parked in another brain dead easy situation, confirms that a couple gallons will be no problem, gets us checked into our cabin close to the top point of the lodge complex area terrain a bit beyond the car. Cabin veranda affords a nice commanding view of some mostly open pasture area sloping a bit down away to the east.
Electricity is solar, cabins get just enough for adequate lighting after the sun goes down, but ya don't wanna squander it 'cause things aren't gonna improve until the sun gets back up again. The main/central building - kitchen, dining, meeting - is juiced up better and they have a charging station for laptops and gadgets.
In the early afternoon we're on the veranda and there's a rather small bird on a branch fairly close in and a bit below our level. I don't think it's gonna prove to be anything very interesting but... "Goddam! That's a TROGON!" Gartered it turns out after checking the field guide.
Harvey takes us south down a drive a couple hundred yards to a pond for some productive birding. First Jacanas for the trip.
We bail, return to the top, beat the bushes around the cabins for a bit, the excursion starts moving down into the pasture area to the east. What the hell, I'll grab the scope. And in short order Harvey scores us a really easy pair of Keel-Billed Toucans. And I've got my scope.
Sure makes up bigtime for those crappy fleeting glances I got of my only previous in Belize. Stunning views of two stunning birds for as long as we cared to stay and look. (Doesn't make up for that shit Roodal did to me in Trinidad with my Groove-Bills however.)
Call it a day, back to the cabin, comfortable dinner back at central with other guests and a few staffers, back to the cabin.
Earlier in the day I'd noticed that the toilet wasn't entirely kicking off after the tank refilled. I'd pulled the lid and played with internal stuff a little but gotten nowhere. Normally I'd have just closed the shut-off valve but there wasn't anything anywhere inside the cabin. Had meant to say something about it but had gotten too overwhelmed by all the stuff going on.
HM flushes and things start going Katrina. I try to tighten a connection but it falls apart and now I've got this little plastic fire hose blasting away full tilt. These cabins are raised, you can walk underneath them, there's gotta be an accessible cutoff valve below but it got solid dark a couple hours ago and I'm not optimistic about being able to find it. And I found I was able to mitigate things a real good bit by aiming my fire hose at a grated drain in the floor. Tell HM to get down the hill and notify Houston that we had a problem.
Cavalry returns with lights and tools and are able staunch the flow in reasonable short order. The cabin's become something of a swamp, they evacuate us and our belongings, gear to the one on the other side of the drive. Then they clear out of the disaster area way sooner than I'd expected and I worry that I lot of unnecessary damage is gonna be done to the wooden floor and furniture. I go back up with a flashlight and, yeah, it's still a major swamp. But it's not really my problem and I don't have enough energy reserves left to try to do anything more anyway.
---
Edit:
- 2019/02/13 22:15:00 UTC
- 2019/02/17 17:30:00 UTC
-
Tad Eareckson
- Posts: 9161
- Joined: 2010/11/25 03:48:55 UTC
Re: birds
2019/01/10 use early daylight to check out the disaster area. Drained on its own, I don't think any permanent damage was done to anything.
Harvey takes us on a morning stroll down a road track that leads to "the airstrip". Points out a hornets' nest hanging from a branch about twenty feet up. Probably something along the lines of the White-Faced Hornets we have in this neck of the woods with the big basketball jobs which become so conspicuous when the leaves come down in the fall but long and narrow. "Let's throw a rock at it to make sure it's really a hornets' nest." Nah, probably not a great idea.
http://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7865/40137302163_ecefdefbcb_o.png
09°49'26.30" N 083°03'40.56" W - 5554'
I have zilch sense of direction when moving through areas in which forest cover obscures the terrain big picture. Everything's downhill from the lodge complex so descents don't tell me anything useful. We easily cross a stream area that's much more rocky bed than flowing water but it's not until yesterday playing with Google Earth that I realize that the airstrip is back across the river we drove through on the way in and just a bit upstream from the fording crossing point.
Gray overcast, good lighting for good birds. Harvey uses my laser.
Jürgen Stein - the owner of Selva Bananito - gets around on a four-wheel ATV and has a pack of maybe seven nice looking German Shepherds that accompany him on his rounds. They’re coming our way, I raise my hands to signal surrender, the dogs see this as a threat and go into attack mode, I tell them to shut up and pet them when they close in for the kill.
http://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7906/40137302093_18488297bd_o.png
09°49'31.77" N 083°03'49.53" W - 3389'
After breakfast we retreat to the cabin. I organize, HM birds off the veranda. The "vista" kinda sucks compared to what we had prior to the flood but... What the hell. It's still very productive turf - possibly more so.
Goddam Long-Billed Hermit hummer sucking the mini-jungle of pink flowers right off and below the deck wouldn't hold still long enough to get him locked with the binocular but he was so close (part of the problem) that it didn't matter much.
Staffers are working underneath our original cabin for a real good chunk of the morning. In addition to the plumbing stuff all the cabins got shorted out. And I'm thinking, "Gee. With a two and a half dollar shutoff valve installed INSIDE the bathroom..."
I've noticed a neglected looking Swarovski scope on a tripod in the dining hall / meeting / commons area and at lunch I ask Harvey about it. Says it was damaged and hasn't been used for ages.
I've got my scope with me, another Snowy Cotinga shows up at a fair range but sticks around a couple prominent exposed perches, makes for fun target practice for near as long as we cared to look.
The place clears, I pull out the lodge's Swarovski. I think it's an ATS 65...
...or maybe something similar but a bit older. (I recorded the model and serial number but can't find it. Must've accidentally deleted it.)
Got a cosmetic scuff on the body but seems otherwise fine. And I figure I'll kill the better part of an hour doing my good deed for the day - with benefit of the cleaning kit I always have with me to deal with scope, binoculars, eyeglasses. Filthy, a pea sized spider has made the objective recess her home (they've got the front end cap but keep it in the desk drawer), back end's a mess. Spider goes over the rail, scope gets broken down, components go under the faucet, detergent solution, sponge, soft bristle toothbrush, lens cleaning solution, micromesh lens cloth... And they've got a REALLY NICE SCOPE for staff and public to use from a really nice viewing platform. And I so inform Harvey.
Harvey's own/guide scope is "easy to carry". And he's good at hitting his target such that his clients can at least get a look at the bird (and get its location (in the absence of a laser or in situations in which a laser's not gonna do much good). But after I get the Keel-Billed Toucan with it I wanna go back to my Canon glasses pretty quick.
Prior to the trip I'm worried about showing up in situations like this with my Lamborghini optical system. Ugly American thing - I don't wanna embarrass guides struggling for economic survival down in these jungle environments. But I never felt any trace of resentment in any of these situations. Just appreciation for the system and my making it available for anyone who cared to use it.
Also on the subject of scopes... Note the little peep sight welded onto the aft starboard area on the Swarovski ATS (and STS). That thing would be worth its weight in gold - if it weighed anything. As it is it's worth a hundred times its weight in gold. You sight your target - while maintaining a virtually full view of everything around it that isn't obstructed by the scope itself - and you're dead-on when you look through the scope.
And I think I just now figured out why it's not a feature of the ATX/STX scope line. I think it's probably a compatibility issue with the digiscoping adapter...
...which cups over the back end of the ocular components of those assemblies.
Harvey, by the way, is one astronomically accomplished individual. Equatorial African ancestry, university degrees coming outta his ass, taught himself every language any of his clients are likely to show up with at the Lodge, designed the gardens at the Hotel Bougainvillea (where we stayed on Night One).
Jürgen joins us at dinner, we discuss Fer-De-Lances (Terciopelos - more properly). Says ten years ago he nearly lost a young female employee to one. Says it was her fault - not the snake's - 'cause she was walking back from where we are now without a flashlight and got between a tiny young one and the frog that was about to become dinner. Jürgen says the little guys can't control delivery volume so just unload everything they've got when they have occasion to use it at all.
She got mainlined and the doctor said she got to within five minutes of death. Thought she'd been hit by a car when she started returning to the land of the living.
By the way... Go to:
http://www.selvabananito.com/
and find something about Terciopelos, flashlights (in any capacity other than as reading lamps for the kids), wildlife safety issues. I guess pit vipers aren't regarded as valuable ecotourist draws. ("What do you say we go instead to a lodge that ISN'T crawling with Fer-De-Lances?")
Nobody's said anything to me and I pretty much never use a flashlight for walking around in the dark. I always wear boots but:
- I'm not real confident about their stopping power in a lot of their areas
- we're only good for about six inches anyway and with a snake that can easily exceed six foot length...
She recovered fully - now has a kid. Jürgen's policy is to leave them alone in the surrounding areas but if they're in the lodge area they're dead. I doubt that that's gonna have any measurable contribution to human safety. Certainly not as much as requiring visitors to navigate in the dark with flashlights would.
The subject of autogyros comes up. Jürgen owns and flies one. That - I then find out - is what the airstrip is for. "What makes them go?" "914 Rotax." "Funny you should mention that particular engine." "Wanna go for a ride tomorrow morning?" "Do Baird's Tapirs shit in the jungle?"
Harvey takes us on a morning stroll down a road track that leads to "the airstrip". Points out a hornets' nest hanging from a branch about twenty feet up. Probably something along the lines of the White-Faced Hornets we have in this neck of the woods with the big basketball jobs which become so conspicuous when the leaves come down in the fall but long and narrow. "Let's throw a rock at it to make sure it's really a hornets' nest." Nah, probably not a great idea.
http://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7865/40137302163_ecefdefbcb_o.png
09°49'26.30" N 083°03'40.56" W - 5554'
I have zilch sense of direction when moving through areas in which forest cover obscures the terrain big picture. Everything's downhill from the lodge complex so descents don't tell me anything useful. We easily cross a stream area that's much more rocky bed than flowing water but it's not until yesterday playing with Google Earth that I realize that the airstrip is back across the river we drove through on the way in and just a bit upstream from the fording crossing point.
Gray overcast, good lighting for good birds. Harvey uses my laser.
Jürgen Stein - the owner of Selva Bananito - gets around on a four-wheel ATV and has a pack of maybe seven nice looking German Shepherds that accompany him on his rounds. They’re coming our way, I raise my hands to signal surrender, the dogs see this as a threat and go into attack mode, I tell them to shut up and pet them when they close in for the kill.
http://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7906/40137302093_18488297bd_o.png
09°49'31.77" N 083°03'49.53" W - 3389'
After breakfast we retreat to the cabin. I organize, HM birds off the veranda. The "vista" kinda sucks compared to what we had prior to the flood but... What the hell. It's still very productive turf - possibly more so.
Goddam Long-Billed Hermit hummer sucking the mini-jungle of pink flowers right off and below the deck wouldn't hold still long enough to get him locked with the binocular but he was so close (part of the problem) that it didn't matter much.
Staffers are working underneath our original cabin for a real good chunk of the morning. In addition to the plumbing stuff all the cabins got shorted out. And I'm thinking, "Gee. With a two and a half dollar shutoff valve installed INSIDE the bathroom..."
I've noticed a neglected looking Swarovski scope on a tripod in the dining hall / meeting / commons area and at lunch I ask Harvey about it. Says it was damaged and hasn't been used for ages.
I've got my scope with me, another Snowy Cotinga shows up at a fair range but sticks around a couple prominent exposed perches, makes for fun target practice for near as long as we cared to look.
The place clears, I pull out the lodge's Swarovski. I think it's an ATS 65...
...or maybe something similar but a bit older. (I recorded the model and serial number but can't find it. Must've accidentally deleted it.)
Got a cosmetic scuff on the body but seems otherwise fine. And I figure I'll kill the better part of an hour doing my good deed for the day - with benefit of the cleaning kit I always have with me to deal with scope, binoculars, eyeglasses. Filthy, a pea sized spider has made the objective recess her home (they've got the front end cap but keep it in the desk drawer), back end's a mess. Spider goes over the rail, scope gets broken down, components go under the faucet, detergent solution, sponge, soft bristle toothbrush, lens cleaning solution, micromesh lens cloth... And they've got a REALLY NICE SCOPE for staff and public to use from a really nice viewing platform. And I so inform Harvey.
Harvey's own/guide scope is "easy to carry". And he's good at hitting his target such that his clients can at least get a look at the bird (and get its location (in the absence of a laser or in situations in which a laser's not gonna do much good). But after I get the Keel-Billed Toucan with it I wanna go back to my Canon glasses pretty quick.
Prior to the trip I'm worried about showing up in situations like this with my Lamborghini optical system. Ugly American thing - I don't wanna embarrass guides struggling for economic survival down in these jungle environments. But I never felt any trace of resentment in any of these situations. Just appreciation for the system and my making it available for anyone who cared to use it.
Also on the subject of scopes... Note the little peep sight welded onto the aft starboard area on the Swarovski ATS (and STS). That thing would be worth its weight in gold - if it weighed anything. As it is it's worth a hundred times its weight in gold. You sight your target - while maintaining a virtually full view of everything around it that isn't obstructed by the scope itself - and you're dead-on when you look through the scope.
And I think I just now figured out why it's not a feature of the ATX/STX scope line. I think it's probably a compatibility issue with the digiscoping adapter...
...which cups over the back end of the ocular components of those assemblies.
Harvey, by the way, is one astronomically accomplished individual. Equatorial African ancestry, university degrees coming outta his ass, taught himself every language any of his clients are likely to show up with at the Lodge, designed the gardens at the Hotel Bougainvillea (where we stayed on Night One).
Jürgen joins us at dinner, we discuss Fer-De-Lances (Terciopelos - more properly). Says ten years ago he nearly lost a young female employee to one. Says it was her fault - not the snake's - 'cause she was walking back from where we are now without a flashlight and got between a tiny young one and the frog that was about to become dinner. Jürgen says the little guys can't control delivery volume so just unload everything they've got when they have occasion to use it at all.
She got mainlined and the doctor said she got to within five minutes of death. Thought she'd been hit by a car when she started returning to the land of the living.
By the way... Go to:
http://www.selvabananito.com/
and find something about Terciopelos, flashlights (in any capacity other than as reading lamps for the kids), wildlife safety issues. I guess pit vipers aren't regarded as valuable ecotourist draws. ("What do you say we go instead to a lodge that ISN'T crawling with Fer-De-Lances?")
Nobody's said anything to me and I pretty much never use a flashlight for walking around in the dark. I always wear boots but:
- I'm not real confident about their stopping power in a lot of their areas
- we're only good for about six inches anyway and with a snake that can easily exceed six foot length...
She recovered fully - now has a kid. Jürgen's policy is to leave them alone in the surrounding areas but if they're in the lodge area they're dead. I doubt that that's gonna have any measurable contribution to human safety. Certainly not as much as requiring visitors to navigate in the dark with flashlights would.
The subject of autogyros comes up. Jürgen owns and flies one. That - I then find out - is what the airstrip is for. "What makes them go?" "914 Rotax." "Funny you should mention that particular engine." "Wanna go for a ride tomorrow morning?" "Do Baird's Tapirs shit in the jungle?"
-
Tad Eareckson
- Posts: 9161
- Joined: 2010/11/25 03:48:55 UTC
Re: birds
We've had discussions about what happens when it rains cats and dogs and the river starts going up. First order of business - get the vehicles across while still possible. The people can be zip-lined out.
Somewhere in the neighborhood of 22:00 the sky opens up. Yeah, the sound off the steel roof wasn't doing anything in the reassurance department but this one was biblical - either the most intense downpour I've ever experienced or a tie for first. I speculated that we'd be spending the next three weeks here. The duration could've been a lot worse but every five second interval feels like an eternity. And this is supposed to be the dry season.
2019/01/11 morning sky was at least partially clear, staffers assure me that the rain was a nonissue with respect to the crossing, we bird our way down to the airstrip with Harvey to rendezvous with Jürgen and some of his crew.
There's a nice hangar on the far side of the strip - that doesn't appear on the 2015/02/24 Google Earth imagery. Houses two birds, MTOsports (http://www.auto-gyro.com/). The white one's his, the red one isn't. His engine has just been rebuilt and this will be the test flight.
I get put on a scale. Jürgen asks if I'd mind losing my boots - nah - but later tells me not to bother.
We taxi out to start position and hang out while getting the engine up to temperature. There's a lever which the pilot pulls to tension a belt which diverts some percentage of engine power from the pusher prop to get the rotor spinning up to 200 rpms - half of what it will be doing to generate lift when we're airborne and the rotor's spinning in response to airspeed.
The runway's 1220 feet and drops over thirty in our WNW to ESE takeoff heading. But there's a pretty abrupt treeline coming up not far beyond the end and I'm thinking that things could get ugly fast if we're not well clear of them and have a power issue. But we commence our roll, get airborne at a slow speed without me knowing or feeling the point, climb away with tons of margin to burn.
I very soon get a perspective of the area which I didn't come close to achieving by coming in on the roads, staying a couple days, zillions of hours studying using Google Earth. We're in the foothills of the Talamanca Mountains and things appear to go nearly straight fuckin' up on a massive scale to the southwest Matter o' fact... Go about 37.3 crowflight miles from the airstrip to the southwest it's a fairly steady uphill climb to the peak of Cerro Chirripó at 12532 feet.
A lot of the flight's substantially depressing though. The Selva Bananito folk are very genuinely dedicated to environmental protection issues and it doesn't take long to see some scary stuff and have other issues pointed out. Centered about half a dozen miles to the NE (near the coast) there's a massive banana plantation monoculture and I watch a yellow crop-duster making low passes and laying down the mist. The Selva Bananito reserve protects a lot of watershed area and the river and streams are crystal. The stuff draining from logging and agricultural areas is brown. And ya know how all this stuff is affecting biodiversity.
Make a low high speed pass (NW heading) on an empty stretch of beach. That was lotsa fun / pretty cool.
And we're moving at a pretty good clip for just about the whole flight. And early on I'd started being real careful about keeping all my parts behind the protection of the back seat plexiglass windscreen.
By the time we're on final I'm feeling like I definitely got my nickel's worth. I think we're coming in on about a one-to-one slope and I start breaking out in a rash and wanna take over the controls. But this ain't fixed wing and we touch down right where we should just fine. I disembark and find myself so tired I can barely stay upright and don't understand why I feel so thoroughly drained. Glad to be able to ride back up to the lodge and breakfast in an ATV.
---
Amendment - 2019/02/17 21:30:00 UTC
Find out from Jürgen why the runway is as scary looking as it is. He's deliberately held it to autogyro-only length. If it's Cessna capable you get visited by the Mexicans who tell you:
- that they'd appreciate being able to use it every now and then
- to tell you to say hello to your mother and sister for them
Somewhere in the neighborhood of 22:00 the sky opens up. Yeah, the sound off the steel roof wasn't doing anything in the reassurance department but this one was biblical - either the most intense downpour I've ever experienced or a tie for first. I speculated that we'd be spending the next three weeks here. The duration could've been a lot worse but every five second interval feels like an eternity. And this is supposed to be the dry season.
2019/01/11 morning sky was at least partially clear, staffers assure me that the rain was a nonissue with respect to the crossing, we bird our way down to the airstrip with Harvey to rendezvous with Jürgen and some of his crew.
There's a nice hangar on the far side of the strip - that doesn't appear on the 2015/02/24 Google Earth imagery. Houses two birds, MTOsports (http://www.auto-gyro.com/). The white one's his, the red one isn't. His engine has just been rebuilt and this will be the test flight.
I get put on a scale. Jürgen asks if I'd mind losing my boots - nah - but later tells me not to bother.
We taxi out to start position and hang out while getting the engine up to temperature. There's a lever which the pilot pulls to tension a belt which diverts some percentage of engine power from the pusher prop to get the rotor spinning up to 200 rpms - half of what it will be doing to generate lift when we're airborne and the rotor's spinning in response to airspeed.
The runway's 1220 feet and drops over thirty in our WNW to ESE takeoff heading. But there's a pretty abrupt treeline coming up not far beyond the end and I'm thinking that things could get ugly fast if we're not well clear of them and have a power issue. But we commence our roll, get airborne at a slow speed without me knowing or feeling the point, climb away with tons of margin to burn.
I very soon get a perspective of the area which I didn't come close to achieving by coming in on the roads, staying a couple days, zillions of hours studying using Google Earth. We're in the foothills of the Talamanca Mountains and things appear to go nearly straight fuckin' up on a massive scale to the southwest Matter o' fact... Go about 37.3 crowflight miles from the airstrip to the southwest it's a fairly steady uphill climb to the peak of Cerro Chirripó at 12532 feet.
A lot of the flight's substantially depressing though. The Selva Bananito folk are very genuinely dedicated to environmental protection issues and it doesn't take long to see some scary stuff and have other issues pointed out. Centered about half a dozen miles to the NE (near the coast) there's a massive banana plantation monoculture and I watch a yellow crop-duster making low passes and laying down the mist. The Selva Bananito reserve protects a lot of watershed area and the river and streams are crystal. The stuff draining from logging and agricultural areas is brown. And ya know how all this stuff is affecting biodiversity.
Make a low high speed pass (NW heading) on an empty stretch of beach. That was lotsa fun / pretty cool.
And we're moving at a pretty good clip for just about the whole flight. And early on I'd started being real careful about keeping all my parts behind the protection of the back seat plexiglass windscreen.
By the time we're on final I'm feeling like I definitely got my nickel's worth. I think we're coming in on about a one-to-one slope and I start breaking out in a rash and wanna take over the controls. But this ain't fixed wing and we touch down right where we should just fine. I disembark and find myself so tired I can barely stay upright and don't understand why I feel so thoroughly drained. Glad to be able to ride back up to the lodge and breakfast in an ATV.
---
Amendment - 2019/02/17 21:30:00 UTC
Find out from Jürgen why the runway is as scary looking as it is. He's deliberately held it to autogyro-only length. If it's Cessna capable you get visited by the Mexicans who tell you:
- that they'd appreciate being able to use it every now and then
- to tell you to say hello to your mother and sister for them
-
Tad Eareckson
- Posts: 9161
- Joined: 2010/11/25 03:48:55 UTC
Re: birds
Breakfast, nail one of those poison arrow frogs I missed at Playa Negra (out in the open along the drive), load the car.
Jürgen gets us a gallon to ensure we make it to Limon, fuel flap opens only with difficulty, fires up the laptop to show us a video of Selva Bananito ongoing projects and goals.
Gravity start, get to the river fording point, water level is a total nonissue - like they assured us it would be. Get back out to the main drag, fuel up in Limon. I'm sure we'd have made it OK minus the extra gallon.
Head inland on 32, next point of major civilization is Siquirres. Looks too much like Squirrels not to call it Squirrels. Limon is a major port city, the highway's under expansion construction and lined with unending stacks of container ship containers for moving all the bananas and pineapples out of the country, terrain is majorly hilly, traffic is moderately gummed up in both directions, I do what I can to help cars and semis to merge in.
And then I start losing it. If I'd been alone I'd have just gotten off the main drag and found someplace to lapse into a coma for a half hour or so. But I'm not. So this means that HM would be taking the helm.
I'm driving in my usual traffic mode - let lotsa space open up between you and the vehicle ahead, drive flow speed, when traffic stops ahead ease off on the gas, arrive at 3 mph just as the clot's starting to move again, force all the motherfuckers behind you to drive safely and efficiently.
HM will implode if he begins to phase out of tailgating mode. If a gap opens up the gas pedal will be on the floor for the first 95 percent of the available space and the brake pedal will be on the floor for what's left over. And under no circumstances allow another vehicle to merge in ahead of you 'cause that'll totally unnecessarily eliminate fifteen feet of otherwise useable airspace between you and goal.
If HM takes the helm he WILL tailgate, do the full gas/brake thing incessantly, stall out trying to start from zero going up a steep hill. And I sure won't be getting anything in the way of sleep, rest, recuperation during any of this off-duty time. I "think" "Well, the traffic's slow, the driving isn't very demanding, I can keep it together for a little longer until things open up adequately."
The next thing I remember is hearing HM say "Tad, are you falling asleep?" Snap awake, jerk the steering wheel to the right to extract us from the oncoming side of the highway, say "Yes. You drive."
Heart's pounding. If he'd also been asleep hopefully a horn would've brought me back. Otherwise I could've easily killed both of us and gawd knows who else eastbound.
Factors...
- The fatigue which almost caused the catastrophe was also an issue in the shit decision making process that brought me to that point.
- If I'd had the luxury of a car that started when the ignition key was turned...
- HM shouldn't have a license. Somebody show me a sixteen year old kid passing his road test driving the way HM does all the freakin' time DELIBERATELY.
In Maryland you gotta get your eyes checked every six years but your brain is assumed to be rock solid from age sixteen until the end of time - manual and/or automatic transmission.
I've got a theory about genuinely crappy drivers I've developed from watching the ones in my family and small social circle. They all think they're top-notch. They're all doing the best jobs possible within the confines of human physiology and automotive engineering. If there were better decision making processes and skills possible they'd have developed them decades ago - obviously. If somebody uses superior skills to safely avoid killing a squirrel or deer it was dangerous - any action beyond their scope.
In Costa Rica where most of the driving was demanding and most of the drivers (probably all the native ones) were very good I could usually rank them - with respect to where I stood on the curve - pretty quickly. "Yeah, this one knows this road really well and how to handle it. If I let him pass me I'll be able to safely maintain the same speed close behind him. And I won't hafta be slamming on the brakes every half mile."
Anyway... There are no good options for pulling over and switching drivers for a long time and I'm wide freaking awake for the rest of the day. We get through Squirrels, leave the gummy traffic behind, continue northwest, I drop to passenger position.
Our next stop was supposed to have been the Estación Biológica La Selva a little south of Puerto Viejo de Sarapiquí but HM back home had altered our schedule without altering those reservations to match and had only a day or two prior discovered the issue. Assesses the chances of them having a late notice opening available as zilch so we'll try something else in the area.
The area... North of San Jose is a big volcanic forested area topping out in its south at about nine and a half thousand feet and extending north to a bit shy of Puerto Viejo de Sarapiquí. Just about all of it is protected within the boundaries of Parque Nacional Braulio Carrillo. There's a lot of less densely forested, open, agricultural land between the northern extent of the park and the Rio Sarapiquí to the west and the river takes a turn to the east at a bit over northern latitude limit. And the highway that runs along the river is lousy with ecotourism lodgings and attractions.
Suggests Selva Verde Lodge as a Plan B. What luck, already have it punched into the Garmin. Pick up a nice parked Crested Caracara in great light en route, blow by the entrance to the Biological Station.
Seems to be a pattern with respect to Costa Rican driving etiquette - the slower the vehicle in front of one is moving the less likely it is to afford vehicles behind it to pass. Seems especially applicable to small farm and commercial trucks.
There's a Lay's (as in potato chips) truck in front of us going nowhere fast on a straight stretch. Then the brake lights and flashers come on for no reason. Then it comes to a complete stop. What the fu...
Then a big Green Iguana emerges into view from in front of the truck scampering across to the left/south side of the highway. Oh. Well done, sir/madam.
Make goal, they have rooms, gated parking area has a nice slope.
This is another MAJOR bird operation - pretty extensive tract of valuable old growth forest rescued in the early Eighties by founder Giovanna Holbrook. Their logo bird is a bit stylized but definitely the Gartered Trogon I'd scored the first afternoon of our previous stop. 260 feet, nice accommodations, rather long hike under a covered walkway from our room in the reception area to the dining, restaurant, bar facility.
Pretty fried by the end of this day. Big surprise. I was pretty fried many hours earlier just before the little nap I took en route.
---
Amended - 2019/02/20 15:30:00 UTC
Jürgen gets us a gallon to ensure we make it to Limon, fuel flap opens only with difficulty, fires up the laptop to show us a video of Selva Bananito ongoing projects and goals.
Gravity start, get to the river fording point, water level is a total nonissue - like they assured us it would be. Get back out to the main drag, fuel up in Limon. I'm sure we'd have made it OK minus the extra gallon.
Head inland on 32, next point of major civilization is Siquirres. Looks too much like Squirrels not to call it Squirrels. Limon is a major port city, the highway's under expansion construction and lined with unending stacks of container ship containers for moving all the bananas and pineapples out of the country, terrain is majorly hilly, traffic is moderately gummed up in both directions, I do what I can to help cars and semis to merge in.
And then I start losing it. If I'd been alone I'd have just gotten off the main drag and found someplace to lapse into a coma for a half hour or so. But I'm not. So this means that HM would be taking the helm.
I'm driving in my usual traffic mode - let lotsa space open up between you and the vehicle ahead, drive flow speed, when traffic stops ahead ease off on the gas, arrive at 3 mph just as the clot's starting to move again, force all the motherfuckers behind you to drive safely and efficiently.
HM will implode if he begins to phase out of tailgating mode. If a gap opens up the gas pedal will be on the floor for the first 95 percent of the available space and the brake pedal will be on the floor for what's left over. And under no circumstances allow another vehicle to merge in ahead of you 'cause that'll totally unnecessarily eliminate fifteen feet of otherwise useable airspace between you and goal.
If HM takes the helm he WILL tailgate, do the full gas/brake thing incessantly, stall out trying to start from zero going up a steep hill. And I sure won't be getting anything in the way of sleep, rest, recuperation during any of this off-duty time. I "think" "Well, the traffic's slow, the driving isn't very demanding, I can keep it together for a little longer until things open up adequately."
The next thing I remember is hearing HM say "Tad, are you falling asleep?" Snap awake, jerk the steering wheel to the right to extract us from the oncoming side of the highway, say "Yes. You drive."
Heart's pounding. If he'd also been asleep hopefully a horn would've brought me back. Otherwise I could've easily killed both of us and gawd knows who else eastbound.
Factors...
- The fatigue which almost caused the catastrophe was also an issue in the shit decision making process that brought me to that point.
- If I'd had the luxury of a car that started when the ignition key was turned...
- HM shouldn't have a license. Somebody show me a sixteen year old kid passing his road test driving the way HM does all the freakin' time DELIBERATELY.
In Maryland you gotta get your eyes checked every six years but your brain is assumed to be rock solid from age sixteen until the end of time - manual and/or automatic transmission.
I've got a theory about genuinely crappy drivers I've developed from watching the ones in my family and small social circle. They all think they're top-notch. They're all doing the best jobs possible within the confines of human physiology and automotive engineering. If there were better decision making processes and skills possible they'd have developed them decades ago - obviously. If somebody uses superior skills to safely avoid killing a squirrel or deer it was dangerous - any action beyond their scope.
In Costa Rica where most of the driving was demanding and most of the drivers (probably all the native ones) were very good I could usually rank them - with respect to where I stood on the curve - pretty quickly. "Yeah, this one knows this road really well and how to handle it. If I let him pass me I'll be able to safely maintain the same speed close behind him. And I won't hafta be slamming on the brakes every half mile."
Anyway... There are no good options for pulling over and switching drivers for a long time and I'm wide freaking awake for the rest of the day. We get through Squirrels, leave the gummy traffic behind, continue northwest, I drop to passenger position.
Our next stop was supposed to have been the Estación Biológica La Selva a little south of Puerto Viejo de Sarapiquí but HM back home had altered our schedule without altering those reservations to match and had only a day or two prior discovered the issue. Assesses the chances of them having a late notice opening available as zilch so we'll try something else in the area.
The area... North of San Jose is a big volcanic forested area topping out in its south at about nine and a half thousand feet and extending north to a bit shy of Puerto Viejo de Sarapiquí. Just about all of it is protected within the boundaries of Parque Nacional Braulio Carrillo. There's a lot of less densely forested, open, agricultural land between the northern extent of the park and the Rio Sarapiquí to the west and the river takes a turn to the east at a bit over northern latitude limit. And the highway that runs along the river is lousy with ecotourism lodgings and attractions.
Suggests Selva Verde Lodge as a Plan B. What luck, already have it punched into the Garmin. Pick up a nice parked Crested Caracara in great light en route, blow by the entrance to the Biological Station.
Seems to be a pattern with respect to Costa Rican driving etiquette - the slower the vehicle in front of one is moving the less likely it is to afford vehicles behind it to pass. Seems especially applicable to small farm and commercial trucks.
There's a Lay's (as in potato chips) truck in front of us going nowhere fast on a straight stretch. Then the brake lights and flashers come on for no reason. Then it comes to a complete stop. What the fu...
Then a big Green Iguana emerges into view from in front of the truck scampering across to the left/south side of the highway. Oh. Well done, sir/madam.
Make goal, they have rooms, gated parking area has a nice slope.
This is another MAJOR bird operation - pretty extensive tract of valuable old growth forest rescued in the early Eighties by founder Giovanna Holbrook. Their logo bird is a bit stylized but definitely the Gartered Trogon I'd scored the first afternoon of our previous stop. 260 feet, nice accommodations, rather long hike under a covered walkway from our room in the reception area to the dining, restaurant, bar facility.
Pretty fried by the end of this day. Big surprise. I was pretty fried many hours earlier just before the little nap I took en route.
---
Amended - 2019/02/20 15:30:00 UTC
-
Tad Eareckson
- Posts: 9161
- Joined: 2010/11/25 03:48:55 UTC
Re: birds
2019/01/12 make the hike to nice buffet breakfast on the building's upper level. Soon notice that all the cool kids are hanging out at the rail on the south end and looking mostly down. Oh! Fruit feeder station below. I relocate accordingly.
Get involved in a conversation with a young indigenous looking gal on my left who speaks very fluent English. Turns out she's a guide and - if I recall correctly - from Drake Bay. We talk about birds, birding, birding ethical issues.
She's anti laser for a couple reasons...
- Batteries. I tell her, yeah, that bothers me too. I normally use rechargeables but as it happens I'm on lithium nons 'cause I'd just popped them in over a momentary convenience issue. But hell, rechargeables also have life expectancies.
- Disturbs the birds. I haven't seen evidence of this but as luck would have it I do a test flash a bit later and the three birds in the target area react a bit. But I think that was also the last time I saw any hint of a problem. I did tons of subsequent zappings and never saw anybody flinch. Down the road I'll see if there's any kind of pattern having to do with species and/or circumstances.
Doesn't like hummer feeders. Yeah, I feel a little guilty about them 'cause the hummers are supposed to be out there pollinating flowers and there may be a downside to sugar water versus nectar. But I still haven't found any actual documentation of significant actual issues.
But I wish I'd thought to say to her...
OK, let's say the lasers ARE a bit disturbing to the birds. So's going into their habitats with bus and boat loads of ecotourists (like Yours Truly). That disturbs them on a much greater scale and it's obvious and undeniable. (And remember that Hoary Redpoll we bounced off the windshield then ran over on the Seward Peninsula last June.)
With the laser you get everybody on target quickly and efficiently and you don't hafta keep winding down the roads disturbing more bird hotspots, spewing more CO2 into the atmosphere for the other eighty percent of your clients to be able to score (twenty percent more per opportunity). This is more efficient, your clients are having much better experiences, and it's ecotourism that's keeping these old growth forests from being turned into logging and pineapple plantation operations.
Ditto with respect to the hummer and fruit feeders. Let's draw and hold the line at the territorial calls recordings and moth/insect lights.
I think after breakfast I went back to the room to retrieve the scope then set up on the ground level in front of the fruit feeders for just about the rest of the daylight hours.
Up in the canopy there's a big orange male Green Iguana proclaiming his territory and an easy sloth gets noticed close in but high.
Two sloths reside in that neck o' the woods and well before we're out of it we're not hurting for either - Hoffmann's Two-Toed and Brown-Throated Three-Toed.
Problem... They're BOTH three TOED - it's the FINGERS which mark the difference. The guides can tell them apart pretty quickly and easily when big hairballs are all that are easily observable but my brain never gets up to the requisite minimum speed - I'm having a hard enough time shifting over from Toed to Fingered. But I can get the scope on this one and count two fingers (claws actually).
Also in the mammals department... There's a Variegated Squirrel who never strays far from the feeders.
Late morning I hear that a couple staffers have a snake outside the entrance area of the building. I waste no time. It's a Blunthead Tree Snake they tell me - something of which I have no prior knowledge - and it's one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. It's about a mile long and a centimeter wide at the thick point. Huge nocturnal eyes bulging from the sides of its tiny little head, vertical slit pupils.
It's supporting itself on the hook end of a snake hook and I wanna get my hands on it but the staffers are a bit reluctant. It gets within range of a softball sized clump of some epiphytic bromeliad (like Spanish Moss) growing a couple feet off the deck on the trunk of a little ornamental tree, totally disappears into it, and I can't find any part of him. The staffers convince him to dislodge, I gain control of him, they see that I'm OK with handling snakes.
If you handle them gently and smoothly lotsa snakes will switch off defense/escape mode and relax - like that Tropical Racer I bagged on Little Tobago. This guy maintains a degree of stiffness and I get crapped on. Deal with it with a pinch of sand.
He reminds me of stuff I've seen in the literature and I ask if he's one of those venomous rear-fanged jobs. No. But he actually IS one of those venomous rear-fanged jobs - as I shortly thereafter confirm. But he's also a lot less dangerous to humans than a lot of Garter Snakes I've handled.
I let him go at the edge of the walkway and he smoothly disappeared back into the jungle.
HM does a little trail work, picks up a pair of Buff-Rumped Warblers not far in from the feeders. Kinda wish I'd given them a shot but I'm really trying to limit my vertical time.
Haven't done well on bats to this point in the trip but we're only about sixty yards from the near edge of the Sarapiquí, have a line of sight to it along with a fair helping of open sky, and as the light begins to fail things start getting substantially interesting.
The ground level bar doesn't have much in the way of walls to isolate it and there's a little bat who keeps zipping in low past tables and patrons and doing touch-and-goes at the top of a pillar. The pillar itself has a thick coat of glossy red/orange paint in which one can see one's reflection pretty well. The repetitions go on near forever and the little guy's starting to attract something of an audience. (This obviously wasn't a new show for the guys behind the bar several yards away.) Finally sticks the landing and immediately disappears into a narrow separation opening at the top. And that was the last we saw of him.
I don't know what was going on. This was obviously home and it's hard to believe that he was actually going for an undoable surface. And it looked like he was returning to roost for the night. But bats return to roost for the day.
At some point in the evening I hear that the lodge had taken in a baby sloth whose mother had been killed on the highway out front.
---
Edit - 2019/02/20 11:35:00 UTC
---
P.S. - 2019/02/20 12:00:00 UTC
I just realized I don't really need to do any experimenting / study with the laser. It's already BEEN / constantly BEING done on a global scale. If lasers WERE disturbing to birds at any significant level they'd beat feet. Guides wouldn't use them 'cause they'd be scaring their cash cows back into the jungle. It would be like... "OK, everybody watch carefully. I'm gonna throw this rock into the branch in which the Blue-Crowned Motmot is perched. You should get a fair glimpse of his back end as he abandons this area until tomorrow morning." Lasers are used 'cause they have zilch effect on the targets.
Get involved in a conversation with a young indigenous looking gal on my left who speaks very fluent English. Turns out she's a guide and - if I recall correctly - from Drake Bay. We talk about birds, birding, birding ethical issues.
She's anti laser for a couple reasons...
- Batteries. I tell her, yeah, that bothers me too. I normally use rechargeables but as it happens I'm on lithium nons 'cause I'd just popped them in over a momentary convenience issue. But hell, rechargeables also have life expectancies.
- Disturbs the birds. I haven't seen evidence of this but as luck would have it I do a test flash a bit later and the three birds in the target area react a bit. But I think that was also the last time I saw any hint of a problem. I did tons of subsequent zappings and never saw anybody flinch. Down the road I'll see if there's any kind of pattern having to do with species and/or circumstances.
Doesn't like hummer feeders. Yeah, I feel a little guilty about them 'cause the hummers are supposed to be out there pollinating flowers and there may be a downside to sugar water versus nectar. But I still haven't found any actual documentation of significant actual issues.
But I wish I'd thought to say to her...
OK, let's say the lasers ARE a bit disturbing to the birds. So's going into their habitats with bus and boat loads of ecotourists (like Yours Truly). That disturbs them on a much greater scale and it's obvious and undeniable. (And remember that Hoary Redpoll we bounced off the windshield then ran over on the Seward Peninsula last June.)
With the laser you get everybody on target quickly and efficiently and you don't hafta keep winding down the roads disturbing more bird hotspots, spewing more CO2 into the atmosphere for the other eighty percent of your clients to be able to score (twenty percent more per opportunity). This is more efficient, your clients are having much better experiences, and it's ecotourism that's keeping these old growth forests from being turned into logging and pineapple plantation operations.
Ditto with respect to the hummer and fruit feeders. Let's draw and hold the line at the territorial calls recordings and moth/insect lights.
I think after breakfast I went back to the room to retrieve the scope then set up on the ground level in front of the fruit feeders for just about the rest of the daylight hours.
Up in the canopy there's a big orange male Green Iguana proclaiming his territory and an easy sloth gets noticed close in but high.
Two sloths reside in that neck o' the woods and well before we're out of it we're not hurting for either - Hoffmann's Two-Toed and Brown-Throated Three-Toed.
Problem... They're BOTH three TOED - it's the FINGERS which mark the difference. The guides can tell them apart pretty quickly and easily when big hairballs are all that are easily observable but my brain never gets up to the requisite minimum speed - I'm having a hard enough time shifting over from Toed to Fingered. But I can get the scope on this one and count two fingers (claws actually).
Also in the mammals department... There's a Variegated Squirrel who never strays far from the feeders.
Late morning I hear that a couple staffers have a snake outside the entrance area of the building. I waste no time. It's a Blunthead Tree Snake they tell me - something of which I have no prior knowledge - and it's one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. It's about a mile long and a centimeter wide at the thick point. Huge nocturnal eyes bulging from the sides of its tiny little head, vertical slit pupils.
It's supporting itself on the hook end of a snake hook and I wanna get my hands on it but the staffers are a bit reluctant. It gets within range of a softball sized clump of some epiphytic bromeliad (like Spanish Moss) growing a couple feet off the deck on the trunk of a little ornamental tree, totally disappears into it, and I can't find any part of him. The staffers convince him to dislodge, I gain control of him, they see that I'm OK with handling snakes.
If you handle them gently and smoothly lotsa snakes will switch off defense/escape mode and relax - like that Tropical Racer I bagged on Little Tobago. This guy maintains a degree of stiffness and I get crapped on. Deal with it with a pinch of sand.
He reminds me of stuff I've seen in the literature and I ask if he's one of those venomous rear-fanged jobs. No. But he actually IS one of those venomous rear-fanged jobs - as I shortly thereafter confirm. But he's also a lot less dangerous to humans than a lot of Garter Snakes I've handled.
I let him go at the edge of the walkway and he smoothly disappeared back into the jungle.
HM does a little trail work, picks up a pair of Buff-Rumped Warblers not far in from the feeders. Kinda wish I'd given them a shot but I'm really trying to limit my vertical time.
Haven't done well on bats to this point in the trip but we're only about sixty yards from the near edge of the Sarapiquí, have a line of sight to it along with a fair helping of open sky, and as the light begins to fail things start getting substantially interesting.
The ground level bar doesn't have much in the way of walls to isolate it and there's a little bat who keeps zipping in low past tables and patrons and doing touch-and-goes at the top of a pillar. The pillar itself has a thick coat of glossy red/orange paint in which one can see one's reflection pretty well. The repetitions go on near forever and the little guy's starting to attract something of an audience. (This obviously wasn't a new show for the guys behind the bar several yards away.) Finally sticks the landing and immediately disappears into a narrow separation opening at the top. And that was the last we saw of him.
I don't know what was going on. This was obviously home and it's hard to believe that he was actually going for an undoable surface. And it looked like he was returning to roost for the night. But bats return to roost for the day.
At some point in the evening I hear that the lodge had taken in a baby sloth whose mother had been killed on the highway out front.
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Edit - 2019/02/20 11:35:00 UTC
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P.S. - 2019/02/20 12:00:00 UTC
I just realized I don't really need to do any experimenting / study with the laser. It's already BEEN / constantly BEING done on a global scale. If lasers WERE disturbing to birds at any significant level they'd beat feet. Guides wouldn't use them 'cause they'd be scaring their cash cows back into the jungle. It would be like... "OK, everybody watch carefully. I'm gonna throw this rock into the branch in which the Blue-Crowned Motmot is perched. You should get a fair glimpse of his back end as he abandons this area until tomorrow morning." Lasers are used 'cause they have zilch effect on the targets.
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Steve Davy
- Posts: 1338
- Joined: 2011/07/18 10:37:38 UTC
Re: birds
Sorry for the interruption but I just have to say that seeing real live sloth in the wild would be a treat. Probably not much action going on there but I suspect that I would be happy to watch him all day.