Beautiful
It was hard to believe that the Conference was over, but I still had a few days to look forward to at Tandayapa Lodge. So fond farewells over dinner, a short night’s sleep, and up again early to meet Tim and Debbie for a day’s birding with Nick.
The plan was to visit the blind at Tandayapa for the early-morning show, then head back to the diverse wonders of Milpe, ending up at Tandayapa again to check in and get a night’s sleep.
I hadn’t managed to visit the blind on our quick visit during the conference, so it was a thrill to walk out the short path in the pre-dawn darkness. The set-up is perfect: a large, comfortable wooden blind with benches and a derelict chair, big viewing windows, and two neatly framed compost piles illuminated by a yellow light of the sort we use to light up our front sidewalk. Though it was still dark, a pair of Immaculate Antbirds was already coming in for the moths and other insects; they were beautiful birds but none too friendly, beating up on a Chestnut-capped Brushfinch that presumed to share the bounty. Russet-capped Warblers hopped around the light, snagging the smaller insects, while White-tipped Doves moved quietly through the undergrowth in the background. A magical place, and I immediately forged plans to light up our compost heap here at home (plans I had to give up once I remembered that our compost is in a big, covered plastic bin!).
One species that eluded us during our short stay in the blind was White-throated Quail-Dove; we took it as a good sign that one was walking quietly along the trail beside us when we left!
Milpe was amazing once again. A Squirrel Cuckoo met us when we stepped out of the van at the preserve; he was relatively bold and brash until he saw the camera, then started slipping squirrel-like through the leafy branches.
The hummingbird party was going full-steam, too, with White-whiskered Hermits zipping in and out and those crazy little Green Thorntails doing their insect imitations. A Purple-crowned Fairy, the only one for me of the trip, flashed past, too. Collared Trogons, a species we had somehow missed on the conference field trip, added to the color and to the noise, but neither Choco Toucan nor Pale-billed Aracari dropped in while we were there.
Back to Tandayapa, this time with a target in mind. I’d had great looks at Turquoise Jay at Guango during the week, and this species would turn out to be fairly common and fairly conspicuous during my stay at Tandayapa. Not so the other jay of the Ecuadorian cloud forest; but Nick knew a spot…. And it didn’t take long before we were enjoying great and close-up views of 4 Beautiful Jays, deep blue-black creatures wearing sky-blue crowns and shouting at the tops of their corvid lungs at us as they moved through the roadside brush.
The evening featured great birds like Andean Pygmy-Owl and Band-winged Nightjar (I was looking the other way when the Swallow-tailed Nightjar fluttered past); but for me, the whole day belonged to the jay that deserves its name.
