Forest Foraging

Sunday August 5

This morning,  we went for a walk in the woods, a three and a half hour long one. It was called La Mesa road in the itinerary but I didn't see a road. 

After a late 7 a.m. breakfast we drove for 15 mins, parked and entered a vegetable growing area at the edge of the forest. We spent the rest of the time walking along a soft, muddy, leaf matted trail through the forest, avoiding the regular pathways of leafcutter ants.One track looked like their motorway, wide and deep, trodden smooth. I hate stepping on them so am constantly looking down.

A big surprise for all - most of all for the animal - was a young Forest Rabbit in the forest edge vegetation. Boy, did it run.

Pam's photo

Few birds for the first half of the time with plenty of butterflies, grasshoppers and spiders to entertain us all. David is leaving to-day but decided to join us for the morning, he takes great photos with his macro lens - I don't carry mine, it's enough of a chore to carry myself.

Blue and Orange 88 - guess how it got its name.....

We detoured off the path to avoid breaking its work of art web.

Thick-tipped Greta. The butterflies have good names too.

The best birds we saw this morning were: Scaly-breasted Wren, White-flanked Ant-wren, Black-faced Ant-thrush, Rufous Mourner (a tick), Spot-crowned Ant-vireo, Red-thighed Dacnis and Lesser Greenlet.

I have time to write this because we turned down the market visit and Pam told Eliecer to go home as we have a full day out to-morrow. The internet reception here is not the best and only available in the Office or just outside it which is where I'm sitting. Uploading one photo took 15 minutes last night which is why there aren't many so far. I'll try again in a minute. We are then going to explore the grounds and take photos.

Basilisks occupy the river which we cross daily. I've seen them run across the water (also known as Jesus lizards), Pam never did!

White-tipped Doves. seen daily but not easy to photograph , even badly !