Xenornis

A spontaneous visit to the Cerro Punta area in late April yielded the following notable observations in Parque Internacional La Amistad. On 29 April, near the lowest point on Sendero El Retoño, at about 2170m I had an extended intermittent sighting through tangled foliage of a Streaked Xenops , behaving very similarly to the familiar Plain Xenops, including hanging upside down. I noted the obvious streaking, supercillary and malar stripes of the same colour compared with those of different colour of the Plain Xenops and with the supercillary only of the larger Ruddy Treerunner seen the previous day, also hanging upside down. I had another brief sighting of Streaked Xenops (maybe the same one) the following day in tangled foliage just below the park entrance, at about 2100m. These altitudes are higher than the range quoted by Angehr. At the spectacular cascade which is the destination of Sendero La Cascada, at about 2400m, on 30 April, I saw an Ochraceous Pewee , on an exposed perch ...

All week we will be on location in Cerro Punta an environs investigating the reports of seeding bamboo and hoping to run into those pesky seeding bamboo followers: Peg-billed Finch, Barred Parakeet, and Maroon-chested Ground-Dove. Since blogger's iPhone interface sucks (i.e. It doesn't have one), we will be posting mostly on Twitter. @xenornis. Go ahead, follow us. But here's what we have so far: yesterday morning I walked up to the grounds of Los Quetzales cabins and found two big patches of bamboo. The first one was completely devoid of birds, but the second had a flock of at least four Peg-billed Finches, foraging and calling. No adult males were seen, just female-plumaged birds. Also seen were Green-fronted Lancebill and Scaly-throated Foliage-Gleaner (shamebird no more). Today I went with Jan Axel Cubilla and Gloriela Archbold to PILA Las Nubes, where we found lots of bamboo but no bamboo followers. After lunch, and after Jan Axel and Gloriela had headed back to ci...

Euclides Campos spent a couple of days birding La Amistad International Park. The highlight for October 7 was a pair of Green-fronted Lancebills seen at El Retoño trail. Things turned for the best on October 8, with Ochraceous Pewee, a male Peg-billed Finch (feeding on the seeding bamboo two meters overhead), and a few Slaty Finches. Also recorded were Ornate Hawk-Eagle and a few Purple-throated Mountain-Gems and Barred Parakeets.

Rosabel and Karl Kaufmann, Delicia and Darién Montañez and Dave Klauber spent an hour or so in the morning (and an hour or so in the afternoon) scanning all likely flycatcher perches on Las Nubes looking unsuccessfully for the Crowned Slaty Flycatcher that was seen in the area a month ago. What we did find was an adult (White-lored) Yellow-throated Warbler and a small flock of (Myrtle) Yellow-rumped Warblers in with a large flock of Tennessee Warblers, darting all over the pines along the downhill section of Calle Principal about 100 yards uphill from the intersection with Calle A.

Kit Larsen with Dennis Arendt, Roger Robb, Paul Sherrell send in the following report: We believe we have sighted a Crowned Slaty Flycatcher in Cerro Azul on Dec 1, 2007 and again in the same place on the 4th. I have attached a photo. The bird matches well the descriptions in the Birds of Colombia and Birds of Ecuador. It matches the photos of the Crowned Slaty Flycatcher we find on the web. We found it on a utility wire adjacent to the Chagres Forest. In size, it is bigger than a Forest Elaenia. It did some flycatching as we watched, returning to its perch after going after a bug. The one thing the photo does not show is that it had a thin yellow line through the crown, which was visible when the wind blew. Also, the base of the lower mandible is lighter than the tip. We were able to observe the bird for more than 30 minutes on each observation. We have more photos - they show pretty much the same as the attached photo; we will submit them when we return home. We have sent the photo ...

Just like last year, Delicia & Darién Montañez found an Ochraceous Pewee at the Parque Internacional La Amistad at Las Nubes, Cerro Punta. The bird was calling and flitting around high in a tree above the trail up to the waterfall, but would sometimes come lower allowing for reasonably good looks. A Tufted Flycatcher was seen and heard further up the trail, and in comparison with the pewee was much smaller and lacked the conspicuous buffy wingbars.