Signs of Life in Estabrook Park

Ometepe pulls out all the stops!

Wow! What a day we had on Ometepe! It was a great sign when I spotted gallinules, jacanas, stilts, and egrets right from the back porch of our hotel building. If I had to choose just one highlight of the morning, it would have to be this crested caracara (Caracara plancus), the first one I’ve been able to show you, only because I’ve been trying to get a presentable picture since I first spotted one when we first arrived in Granada.

The rest will have to wait for another day, because I have even more to show you from our afternoon. The island of Ometepe comprises two volcanoes connected by a low isthmus, and the isthmus is nearly split by a river that meanders through a wide wetland. After lunch, we rented a couple of kayaks and hired a guide to take us up that river. Our guide was quite good, but we had already seen just this morning most of the wildlife he was able to show us. There were a few notable exceptions, however, so here they are.

I’m thrilled to report that pacific screech-owls (Megascops cooperi) appear to be quite common here, because our guide found us a pair in a tree overhanging the lake before we even entered the river, a third one over the river, and we just heard a fourth out the window of our room back here at the hotel.

As I already mentioned, I saw gallinules first thing this morning, but they were of the “common” variety, which we get to see in Horicon Marsh nearly every time I visit. This afternoon, on the other hand, I got to see my first purple gallinule (Porphyrio martinica), which is a tad more colorful.

We’ve seen snail kites before, most recently in Belize, but I haven’t been able to get a portrait of one like this until today.

A sight to rival the owls had to be a small colony of proboscis bats (Rhynchonycteris naso) simply clinging to the underside of a leaning tree trunk. Man, did they blend in, and we had a heck of a time seeing them even when we were right under them. As my mom used to say, “if they were snakes, they would have bitten me.” Good thing they are “exclusive insectivores,” eh?

But wait, there’s more. This sleepy head is our very first common pauraque (Nyctidromus albicollis) and a relative of the common nighthawk we saw in Estabrook for the first time just last spring.

Lastly, back at our hotel, here is a western giant swallowtail (Heraclides rumiko), another first for me and only my fourth swallowtail species.

Once again, it is time for me to hit the sack, and I hope we take it a little easier tomorrow so I can catch you up a little more on all we saw today.

A fine farewell from Granada…

This is gonna be short, ’cause it’s late, and I am beat. Anne and Deb did graduate from their Spanish classes this morning, and then we did drive down the lake shore to catch a ferry to the island of Ometepe, but before that all happened, I got to visit the lake front and river in Granada one last time.

It turns out that that cute little green kingfisher I showed you Wednesday was the Mrs., as you may have noticed, and today the Mr. decided to show his gorgeous face. What a charmer, eh!

As I cross the river, I noticed a bustle in the trees across the street, and it turned out to be caused by this fascinating creature, my very first variegated squirrel (Sciurus variegatoides). If you’re saying to yourself right now, “that looks like no variegated squirrel I’ve ever seen,” well, that could be because “the several subspecies differ in appearance and there is often a considerable variation between the appearances of individuals in the same population.” Furthermore, “in Nicaragua and Costa Rica, some individuals have pale underparts and tails,” which appears to be the case here.”

Finally, the last new bird I saw in Granada just happens to be this stunner, my very first turquoise-browed motmot (Eumomota superciliosa), the national bird of Nicaragua. I realize that this picture is not quite the portrait that the Lesson’s motmot let me have, but I can just hear this cheerful-looking little bird opining, “I’m the dang national bird! Be thankful you even got a picture at all!” To which I would reply, “oh, I am! I most definitely am!”

Now, I’m gonna hit the sack so I can get up and look for wildlife tomorrow.

On the 5th day, Nicaragua rested…

We did make it to the Masaya volcano this afternoon, and we did see and smell plenty of sulfurous gas wafting out of a giant caldera, but we did not manage to see any glowing lava. Oh well. There is enough gas these days, however, that they do try to limit tourists’ time at the rim to just five minutes. After that, since we were already there, and they have a whole park surrounding the volcano, we walked around a bit to see who we could see.

The first fun sight I managed to capture on film is of this black spiny-tailed iguana crawling through the underbrush. We just saw one on Caye Caulker last fall, but I read that “coloration varies extremely among individuals,” and this one is much more colorful.

While I was busy with the lizard, Anne spotted this tiny bird flitting about in some branches over the trail. I took a couple dozen pictures, and I was relieved to find that one came out, which enables us to ID this cutie as a white-lored gnatcatcher (Polioptila albiloris). It is only my second gnatcatcher, after the blue-grays we see in Estabrook, but it is the 700th species for which I’ve uploaded pictures to ebird, and the 800th species I’ve posted on ebird, at all. “Thanks, Darlin’!”

The next most interesting sight in the park was this wasp nest hiding in plain sight on the side of a tree trunk. My sources tell me that it is the nest of northern warrior wasps (Synoeca septentrionalis). I read that they are “known for possessing an extremely painful sting,” and upon hearing the name, my sister expressed gratitude for the height at which they built this nest.

We didn’t have a ton of time to spend at the park, and those are the highlights, so let me show you a few more pictures from yesterday. Here’s a groove-billed ani beside the river, which we first saw in Belize, but this poor thing was all alone and had no one to snuggle with, and I sure hope that gets rectified soon.

On the other side of the river, I found another gorgeous black-headed trogon, which we last saw in Guatemala.

Finally, how could I not show you another motmot picture, especially when it let me take a portrait like this.

Tomorrow is graduation day for Anne and Deb, and then we drive down the lake shore to catch a ferry to the island of Ometepe. There is supposed to be great wildlife there, and if I get pictures of any, I’ll be sure to show them to you.

Nicaragua day 4 says “hold my beer!”

The sky was cloudy and the air was nearly still when the sun came up in Granada this morning, and I did not know that either were even possible here, so after three days of clear skies and strong winds, both were a treat.

The next treat was spotting this tiny green kingfisher at the river. Even better, after a couple of false starts, it decided to give us a nice pose. I’ve only ever been able to show you one from Belize, and it wasn’t quite as accommodating.

With the wind not howling for a change, I was even able to get my first butterfly picture of this trip, and here it is, a white-rayed metalmark (Melanis cephise).

Once Anne and Deb were done with their Spanish lessons for the day, we did indeed drive over to the Apoyo Lagoon Natural Reserve, and it is a spectacular crater lake, but I was underwhelmed with the wildlife, at first. After lunch, however, we went for a little hike, and things really started to turn around when Anne spotted this stunning common squirrel-cuckoo (Piaya cayana). Deb had actually seen one at Tikal just last fall, but I failed to get it on film at the time. Thankfully, I had better luck today!

There were also monkeys in the treetops, and these ones turned out to be mantled howler monkeys (Alouatta palliata). We had all just seen (and heard!) howler monkeys at Tikal, but none of us even knew there was more than one type, despite those having the fancy name of Yucatán black howler monkeys. Ha!

The star of the show for today, if only because Deb had heard that it is the national bird of Nicaragua, was this astounding motmot. Actually, the national bird is the turquoise-browed motmot (Eumomota superciliosa), and this is a Lesson’s, or blue-diademed, motmot (Momotus lessonii), instead. But hey, it’s our first motmot, so give us a break!

Finally, we drove down to the water, and the parade of amazing wildlife continued unabated. We saw egrets, herons, grebes, and even frigate birds, but just as we were packing up to go back to our hotel, this gorgeous ringed kingfisher made the nicest portrait.

We made it back to Granada just before dark and returned the rental to the fire station parking once again with no tickets, scratches, or dents. Woo hoo! The plan for tomorrow, after Spanish class, is to drive to the Masaya volcano and try to see some lava. Wish us luck!

Nicaragua continues to deliver on day 3 …

It was another gorgeous morning in Granada, but Deb and I didn’t have much luck before breakfast today, so when she and Anne went to class, I went back to the river that had been so fruitful yesterday. There, I didn’t see any more species that were new to me, but I did finally get a picture of a green heron, which we get to see all summer in Estabrook Park, and which I kept chasing in vain yesterday. It looks as though it may be a youngster, and perhaps it hasn’t yet learned that it’s not supposed to let me see it.

As with the lapwing just yesterday, I needed eyes on the back of my head while I was searching the river because of the action right behind me. This time, it was an Inca dove strutting around on a basketball court, and I haven’t seen one since my first visit to Guatemala, nearly a year ago.

With no new sights there, I continued along the lake shore and discovered a whole new biome on the other side of the river with lots of tall trees creating a pretty good canopy, and it didn’t take long for this beauty to appear in it. In case you don’t recognize it, this is another Montezuma oropendola, which we first saw in Guatemala just this past fall. As I was reading a little more about it, it was fun to learn that “in total body mass, the males are 100% bigger than the females, which … makes [it] one of the most sexually-dimorphic birds in the world.“

Luckily, there were also some openings in the canopy, and one was big enough to let me catch sight of and even sneak a picture of our very first wood stork (Mycteria americana). I had hoped to see one this trip, and its plumage resembles that of the white stork we saw in South Holland, but its face looks more like that of a pale vulture with a very long beak. I read that “it is the only stork species that breeds in North America,” and maybe I’ll see one there someday, but today I’m thrilled just to see one at all.

Finally, I spotted another large bird in the canopy, and it reminded me of the brown jays we saw in Guatemala, which I somehow failed to show you, but this one turns out to be our first ever white-throated magpie-jay (Cyanocorax formosus). Sadly, I cannot find anything definitive on how they got the “magpie-jay” moniker, other than the suggestion that their heads are “jay-ish”, and their long tails are “magpie-esque”. It is a little hard to see in this picture, but its tail is about as long as its head and body together.

Tomorrow, as soon as class is done, we’re heading off to the Apoyo Lagoon Natural Reserve, which is supposed to be rife with wildlife, so if I come up empty in the morning, I might still be able to get something to show you by dinner. Keep your fingers crossed.

Nicaragua, Day 2. More new beauties…

As promised, Anne and Deb did indeed go to Spanish class this morning, but we had breakfast before they went, and even before that we had a solid hour to look for wildlife from the rooftop patio of our hotel as the sun came up over Granada.

There was plenty to see, but the best new sighting from that stretch was this Hoffmann’s woodpecker (Melanerpes hoffmannii), who posed beautifully on this post in front of a bright red wall, and whose range is limited to just Nicaragua and Costa Rica.

There was also a swallow that we kept seeing overhead and that we couldn’t get a good enough look at to identify. But when I set out after breakfast, look who was waiting for me on a wire over the sidewalk just outside our hotel. It turns out not to be a swallow at all but is a martin instead, and a gray-breasted martin (Progne chalybea), to be exact. They have a much larger range than the woodpecker, and it extends from Mexico all the way to Argentina.

From that sidewalk, I hiked down to the shore of Lake Nicaragua, and I followed the shore until I hit a small river that empties into the lake. On the river is where I found only my second ever least grebe.

As I scoured the river for other sights, look who parked right on the grass behind me: the first southern lapwing I’ve seen since Anne and I visited Brazil a couple of years ago.

Finally, back in the river, I came across a small flock of eight black-necked stilts, which we last saw in the Horicon marsh just last summer. They are spotted from Alberta to southern Chili, but most of Nicaragua appears to be a non-breeding part of their range.

I saw plenty more, but it’s getting late, and those are the highlights. Our plan for tomorrow is about the same as today’s, which is great because I’ve found it usually takes me a few days to find all the wildlife lurking in a place like this. I’ll keep you posted.

Nicaragua Day 1!

Sorry this is so late today, but Anne and I finally arrived at our initial destination, Managua, Nicaragua, just after midnight this morning. We hustled to our hotel by the airport, woke up my sister, Deb, who had arrived earlier yesterday, and hit the sack as fast as we could.

This morning, we were woken right around sunrise by a wonderful cacophony of great-tailed grackles, melodious blackbirds, and white-winged doves, which we’ve seen plenty of already.

The hotel grounds, as is often the case, was wonderfully jungly, and look who we found there in addition to our alarm clocks: my very first rufous-backed wren (Campylorhynchus capistratus), which appears to be very local to the Pacific side of central Central America. Cool.

With so much habitat and so many birds, I had my fingers crossed for a raptor, but secretly of course, so as not to jinx it. Well, my gambit paid off, in spades, with my very first, and aptly-named gray hawk (Buteo plagiatus). These are a little more wide-spread, and their range reaches from Panama into the southwestern US.

Then we had to break for breakfast, go pick up our rental car, and drive down to Granada, where Anne and Deb will be taking Spanish lessons all week. Before classes start tomorrow morning, however, we got to stroll around the beautiful, old Spanish colonial city. The bird life wasn’t quite so rich, if only because it was mid-afternoon, but we did spot this darling little cinnamon hummingbird (Amazilia rutila).

I have glimpsed at least one before, but this is the first one to allow a decent picture. In fact, I was a little surprised by how it just sat there and let me take pictures, but as we watched it, we came to learn that it was probably a recent fledgling who appeared to be still being fed by a parent, who would pop in for just a few seconds every few minutes. Amazing!

I hope to get back to a more normal schedule tomorrow, while Anne and Deb are busy with their lessons, so wish me luck!

The babies of 2025…

While I’m traveling today, let me show you some of the babies we got to welcome into Estabrook Park last year.

The first ones came in March, when I started to see the amazing great horned owlets, although I had to keep them under wraps until the end of May. Sorry about that.

In April, we had seven darling goslings on the pond, and here they are with Mom and Dad up on the lawn.

In May, my old buddy Mike found us that hummingbird nest during our weekly wildlife walk, and even though there are no chicks yet, this is still my favorite image from that whole amazing series.

At the end of June, we saw a fresh-looking brood of wood duck ducklings on the river with their mom.

Early in July, our first brood of ducklings, mallards this time, appeared on the pond.

Finally, in mid-July, here’s a doe and her young fawn on the upstream island in the river.

I can hardly wait to see who we get to welcome this year!

Another mystery potentially solved…

The forecast lake effect snow held off till after 9am today, and the weather was otherwise relatively mild, compared to what we’ve been enjoying lately, so it was a pleasant morning in Estabrook Park. The critters, on the other hand, seemed to act as though heavy snow was imminent, and I only had one decent photo opportunity. The good news is that the bufflehead drake is back in one of the slivers of open water on the river, and he was the one who allowed me to sneak a nice picture.

Every variety we’ve seen lately of the goldeneyes was there, the adult male, the young male, the female with an orange tip, and the female without, but none were as accommodating as the bufflehead, so here’s a picture from yesterday.

Similarly with the common mergansers, I saw a couple of males and a few females, but I have to resort to this picture which I also got yesterday.

Finally, as far as Estabrook Park is concerned, the robins were pretty thick again this morning, after being absent for a while this month, but I had this nice picture from yesterday of one taking sips of river water when the sun was out, so I left them alone today.

Now, back to Portage for a moment. At one point, as we were scanning the fields for prairie-chickens, three raptors put on quite an aerial show, and two of them were pretty clearly rough-legged hawks, the one at the top and the one on the right in this picture, but the third one was a mystery. Candidates included a “dark-morph” rough-legged, but it is clearly bigger than the other two, which wouldn’t be the case with a simple color morph; a common raven, which we did hear a couple of times, but they also are not this big, and they have a different tail shape; a “dark-morph” red-tailed hawk, which do exist, but they still have plenty of light feathers in their wings. So, who could it be?

Happily, as the morning wore on, we had other opportunities to catch glimpses of the mysterious dark bird, and I got better pictures. When I checked with our AI over lords the next day, they suggested an eagle! Even better, young bald eagles, which are also dark, are generally mottled instead of having the light and dark wing pattern you can just make out in this image. Thus, this appears to be our first golden eagle (Aquila chrysaetos), instead, subject to confirmation by the experts, of course, but they did accept a golden eagle observation just a month ago. Keep your fingers crossed!

Finally, after a fine lunch at the Plover Cafe, in Plover, WI, we took a quick swing through the fantastic Schmeeckle Reserve “on the campus of UW-Stevens Point”, in hopes of seeing the pileated woodpecker that has been spotted there recently, but we had no luck with that, and the nicest sight I saw was this deer lounging in the sun.

Lastly, if you’ve been wondering when Anne was going to whisk me away on another fabulous adventure, well, tomorrow is that day. I won’t have time to stop in Estabrook before we go, so I’ll post something from the archives to wet your whistle while we travel, but I hope to have new content as early as Sunday. Wish me luck!

Buena Vista Prairie Chicken Meadow

First, thanks to all of you who came out to the Friends of Estabrook Annual Meeting last evening. We had a great turnout for such a cold day, and I’m sorry that I didn’t get to show as many pictures as I had expected, but Harold had a lot of ground to cover.

Now, on with the show. As you may recall, I mentioned going on a field trip yesterday in my previous post, and the destination was the fabulous Buena Vista Prairie Chicken Meadow in southwestern Portage County, WI. It was a cold day, with temps below zero until lunch time, and a stiff breeze, but at least the sun was mostly out. I’ll spare you all the details, because I’ve got a lot to show you today, but the end result is that we did get to see quite a few greater prairie-chickens (Tympanuchus cupido). They are quite skittish, however, even when they were a couple hundred yards away, and we stayed by the car, so this is about the best image I could muster.

We also saw at least two rough-legged hawks (Buteo lagopus), which I have glimpsed once before, at County Grounds Park last winter, but now I have a presentable picture to show you.

Finally, while trying to get a better look at some prairie chickens, we did stumble upon my very first northern shrike (Lanius borealis). As you can see, the prairie is quite expansive and gave the birds plenty of room to keep their distance. That would explain all the blinds they had set up, which I hear can be reserved for getting closer looks. Maybe I’ll give that a try next time. Thanks to John for leading our group and Jenny for all the driving!

In Estabrook Park this morning, the weather was a bit warmer, the wind was a bit lighter, and the sun was a bit brighter, so it felt a lot more comfortable. It took a while, as might be expected after a long, cold night, but a few birds did show their faces today, and here’s a male northern cardinal foraging on the snow that covers the ice on the pond. For comparison, I cropped this picture exactly the same amount, to 2000 pixels wide, as I cropped the shrike and chicken pictures above.

While I was at the pond, all the little birds suddenly got quiet, and that’s because they all watched this Cooper’s hawk swoop in. The hawk didn’t stay long, though, and soon left empty talloned.

On the river, the ice cover continues to grow, but there are still slivers of open water, and our interesting-looking goldeneye was there again today. Even better, it appears that the bump on his bill was indeed an accumulation of ice, which had melted off by this morning. Mystery solved!

Finally, the star of the show today, for me at least, was our first fully mature male goldeneye in Estabrook so far this winter. Woo Hoo! Ain’t he a handsome devil! I read just this morning that ice cover on the great lakes has surged in the past couple of weeks, and Lake Michigan is at 35%, while the long-term average only peaks at 28%. Thus, since ice accumulates first along the shore, the diving birds that visit us during the winter may be finding that they now have to dive farther than they like. Whatever the reason, I’m sure glad he chose to give us a visit at last.

Lastly, I see we are currently forecast to have snow showers tomorrow morning, so who knows what I’ll get to see, but I’ll be sure to let you know.