Guatemala: El Pilar

The stereotype is that birders live for novelty: if it’s not new, it’s not worth looking at. But then why was I so excited to learn that we’d be paying several visits to Finca El Pilar? I’d been there a number of times on earlier visits to Guatemala, and the hours spent birding there this year simply confirmed its status for me as one of the most pleasant birding places in the country.

We left lovely Antigua early, and our nimble bus took us up to where the forest opened up and blue skies greeted our first birding morning. The volcanoes welcomed us, too, with the occasional puff of an eruption.

Sights like that, and the constant memento mori of Antigua’s many earthquake-shattered ruins, should have worried us, I suppose, but vaguely alarming seismic activity just seems like part of the Guatemala experience, and I sort of enjoyed the thrill of it all as we watched Eastern Bluebirds, Rufous-collared Thrushes, and natty little Black-headed Siskins before entering the forest.

The woods were alive with birds, familiar and tropical alike, from the omnipresent Townsend’s and Tennessee Warblers to Red-faced Warblers and Slate-throated Redstarts.

This is a lousy photo, even worse than I thought it would turn out to be, but it does show how strikingly yellow this individual was on the underparts; all the others I saw this visit were the usual red-orange, but this bird was a lovely reminder that we were nearing the range of the yellowstarts.

Possibly the most significant sighting up top at El Pilar was of a “Solitary” Vireo with a poorly defined head pattern; here in Arizona, I’d have called it Cassin’s Vireo with no hesitation, but none of us had long enough or close enough views to rule out the possibility that the bird was merely an ill-marked Blue-headed Vireo, of which several others were in evidence.

Reluctantly we headed into the forest and downhill, taking advantage of the beautifully constructed boardwalks and cleated steps that made even these steep slopes easily manageable.

Along the way we enjoyed the “usual” birds: vocal but invisible Singing Quail (like five-pound wrens that had just drunk triple espressos), Pacific Parakeet, Golden-olive Woodpecker, wonderful little Tufted Flycatchers, Black-capped Swallow, Bushy-crested Jay, Brown-backed Solitaire, and on and on. Butterflies were good, too, drawn to the water that channels down the canyon to fill the ponds and swimming pool at the finca headquarters.

Awaiting us at the bottom of the trail were the famous hummingbird feeders, with Violet and Rufous Sabrewings and White-eared, Azure-crowned, and Berylline Hummingbirds; we’d seen a few Green-throated Mountain-gems on our walk, too. But perhaps just as important to hungry hikers was what else we encountered.

Breakfast, elegantly served ‘neath the new pavilion. And a few hours later we returned for an equally elegant evening meal, this time accompanied by a series of tableaux vivants, frames and all.

How I longed to get them to break character; never did.