Xenornis

Rosabel & Karl Kaufmann and Darién Montañez spent the better part of the last two weeks chasing after their 600th year birds in Western Panama. First stop on November 3 was the marsh at Las Lajas beach, where the highlight was a calling Gray-breasted Crake . We then headed to the Fortuna area, which we birded out of the ANAM sation in Palo Seco. We got to Chiriquí Grande at dusk, right in time to coax responses from a pair of  Uniform Crakes by the Two Tanks Road dump. November 4 began at Continental Divide Trail, which had the usual big mixed flocks interspersed with long periods of birdless quiet, and produced Black-thighed Grosbeak, Rufous-breasted Antthrush and Rufous-rumped Antwren. The access road beyond the trailhead is now paved [map], and dives into Palo Seco all the way down to a Petroterminales pumping station at 725m. A stop at around 900m got us Black-headed Nightingale-Thrush , White-crowned Manakin , and Blue-and-gold Tanager. Verrugosa Trail [ map ] is stil...

Rosabel Miró and I spent seven days (April 13-19) exploring Changuinola and environs thoroughly, scouting locations for the Birding Spots in Panama book and doing a little hunting for lifers on the side. Justo Camargo and Dinora López, two Univeristy of Panama students, tagged along, and Karl Kaufmann joined us for the second half of the trip. Highlighs follow: Green Ibis: Two pairs seen on the 19th, perched on trees at Chiriquí Grande's Two Tank Road, just before the road out to the dump. Crested Caracara: First Bocas record. A raggedy-looking adult seen on the old ricefields on the morning of the 16th. Gray-breasted Crake: Heard only. One on the 14th in a dry grassy field across from the banana plantation on the road to he Camino Ecológico through San San, about 500 m before the end. Another one heard on the old rice fields on the 15th and two heard at the same place on the 16. Rosabel mentioned hearing its characteristic tinkling call two weeks ago on the Ruddy Crake spot near t...