Xenornis

Last week Moyo Rodriguez and I (Venicio Wilson) guided a couple of dutch birdwatchers, Yvonne and Atze, into eastern Panama. We had and incredible luck finding birds we had not seen yet in the previous months of development of a new Canopy Tower tour to the Darien lowlands. Orange-breasted Falcon was seen near the ‘Mirador’ in Nusagandi, Guna Yala. A pair was spoted by the group and Moyo noticed the large size of the bird. Once we stopped the car we heard clearly the falcons' calling and realized the call was nothing similar to a Bat Falcon, which are much more common. After playing the Orange-breasted Falcon call the female flew some 40-50 meters above us allowing us to see her breast band! Later we saw the same couple perched and I made some crummy pictures that I still like to share with you. Nusagandi produced some great birds such as White-thighed Swallow , Rufous Piha, Crested Guan, Black-and-Yellow, Dusky-faced and Sulphur-rumped Tanagers . During our second day we b...

Margelys Barría reports on the last few months of notable sightings from the Panama Rainforest Discovery Center on Pipeline Road: 1. Nuestro primer gran avistamiento fue el del Rufous-vented Ground-Cuckoo en el camino de acceso a nuestro centro de Visitantes, que fue visto por Margelys Barria, guia del P.R.D.C. y por Alcibiades Sarco (personal de mantenimiento), eran como las 6:30 de la mañana y ambos lo pudimos observar sin necesidad de binoculares por lo cerca que estabamos. Dos dias despues estaba en la parte de atras del Centro de Visitantes detras de un grupo de hormigas guerreras el avistamiento fue hecho por Julia Sarco y Margelys Barria ambas guias del PRDC y por el señor Iván Muñoz (personal de mantenimiento), sin necesidad de binoculares, fue visto aproximadamente como a las 11:00 am. Luego una semana despues fue visto en uno de los senderos del PRDC. por Julia Sarco y un grupo aproximado de 15 estudiantes del Istituto Nacional. Al pasar dos semanas nuevamente avistado por d...

On our way back from the PAS fieldtip to Santa Fe, we made a short detour to check out Las Macanas Marsh, near Santa María, and had a number of pretty good sightings. Orquídea found a juvenile Great Blue Heron, and Snail Kites were everywhere, as were Glossy Ibis. A Limpkin flushed from the vegetation near the small dock and flew to the other side of the marsh and Delicia had an even briefer look at what had to be a Masked Duck, small, brown and with white wingpatches, which flew up from the vegetation and dove down almost immediately. Among the thousands of Wattled Jacanas which were all over the place was a weird individual with what appeared to be an all-brown back (which stayed in the vegetation, ducking out of sight frequently). The red rictal lappets (the wattles) were visible thrugh the scope, but the top part of its red frontal plate was bluish white, which made this bird look even weirder. But the birds of the day were without a doubt the Fulvous Whistling-Ducks. The first sig...

Rosabel Miró sent a report of a trip to Rodman Ponds and the west bank of the canal. The highlight was a Limpkin seen on a small pond next to the Panamerican Highway, and a male Hooded Warbler seen on the road to the ponds Hoy fuimos con Indra Candanedo y Bill Porteus a algunos sitios que a María Allen y Danny George se le asignan para el conteo Pacífico. Uno de los problemas que enfrentamos es que han puesto una puerta con llave en la entrada a los ex-caminos del Army (K-19, etc.) y como los de seguridad no tienen llave, no pudimos entrar. Contamos con el permiso de la ARI para los conteos pero si no tenemos llave, es lo mismo que nada. Vamos a tratar de solucionar el problema. En menos de una hora pudimos observar en el área de Cocolí: - Limpkin (en la carretera interamericana, a cien metros de haber pasado la entrada a la base naval de Rodman, en un charquito al lado de la calle. se veía un poco chico a su tamaño normal y tenía el pecho y partes ventrales blancas lo que no concuerda...