25 February 2009
All three photos are from today’s walk. The first two are intended to illustrate the stunning gradient of habitat conditions here. These photos were taken about 2.5 mi apart by road. The right one is on an exposed bluff overlooking the gulf of Nicoya (about 4000 feet below us and about 30 miles to the west as the crow flies). This northwestern zone of Costa Rica is rather arid. The left photo is from the vicinity of the cloud forest reserve. I don’t know what the annual pattern looks like, but since we’ve been here, the airflow has been strongly from the northeast, rising to the continental divide just a few miles (and 500-1000 feet of vertical) from our flat. The clouds and the rain consistently start from that direction. Often, we can look out our windows to the northeast and it is cloudy and sometimes rainy. Simultaneously, we’ll look out our window to the west and the sky is blue!
As I was returning home, I was buzzed by a toucanet — he flew past me from behind just a few feet from my head and landed in a small tree just in front of me. I watched him hop around in the dense vegetation for a while and only had this one decent opportunity for a photo. Not a great shot, but still a nice memory of a fun bird sighting.
All three photos are from today’s walk. The first two are intended to illustrate the stunning gradient of habitat conditions here. These photos were taken about 2.5 mi apart by road. The right one is on an exposed bluff overlooking the gulf of Nicoya (about 4000 feet below us and about 30 miles to the west as the crow flies). This northwestern zone of Costa Rica is rather arid. The left photo is from the vicinity of the cloud forest reserve. I don’t know what the annual pattern looks like, but since we’ve been here, the airflow has been strongly from the northeast, rising to the continental divide just a few miles (and 500-1000 feet of vertical) from our flat. The clouds and the rain consistently start from that direction. Often, we can look out our windows to the northeast and it is cloudy and sometimes rainy. Simultaneously, we’ll look out our window to the west and the sky is blue!
As I was returning home, I was buzzed by a toucanet — he flew past me from behind just a few feet from my head and landed in a small tree just in front of me. I watched him hop around in the dense vegetation for a while and only had this one decent opportunity for a photo. Not a great shot, but still a nice memory of a fun bird sighting.
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