Costa Rica Bird Book

[Brian Bailey]

I'll be visiting Costa Rica next month, and I'm looking for advice on bird books.  This is not a birding trip, but I plan to bird when I can.  There appears to be quite a few guides available.  Does anyone have recommendations?  

Thanks,

BB

[cabz]

I got "A Guide to the Birds of Costa Rica" by Gary. F Stiles and Alexander F. Skutch at Open Air Books, which is in Toronto on Toronto Street.  It is a short street, north and south, but cannot remember the cross streets.  Open Air is at the north end, on the southeast corner, down the stairs in the basement.  The birdbooks were, at least the last time I was there, from the desk, turn right, carefully!!!!!!!! and go to the south wall.  I also took this book on a last minute trip to Panama and got alot of the birds.  Also got the books for my recent South American trip at Open Air.  Great store.  Make sure you have lots of time to browse.

Hope you enjoy your trip to Costa Rica and good birding while you are there.

Happy New Year

Cabz

[cloaca]

I'd go instead with the new book by Garrigues/Dean.  It is actually field guide sized, unlike the Stiles/Skutch book.

The Stiles/Skutch book is a great reference, but you won't want to be carrying it around with you and pulling it out very much.  It's like carrying around the big Sibley.  

The Garrigues/Dean book also has the species accounts/range maps with the drawings, vs. the old-style separate plates and accounts in the Stiles/Skutch book.  It's also very new, so distributions and occurences are way more up-to-date.

Plus, it's a lot cheaper.

Definitely the Garrigues/Dean book.

[norman]

Buy both. Skutch's is the "bookshelf" reference, and the other (I picked it up down there last March for $U.S.30.00) is for travel. The new one is, as noted, excellent, and includes recent taxonomic changes.


I'd advise studying the flycatchers, some the very similar smaller dickie-birds (passerines) and the hummers before you go -- where ranges overlap, they can be difficult to separate without a little warning.


What part of CR are you visiting? I've spent some time down there.

[melaniese]

watch out for the scorpions too! my mom was there in feb 2008 on a bird trip and got bitten by a scorpion that was in her shoe. check your shoes before you put them on! luckily she wasn't really affected by it.

[Brian Bailey]

Thanks for all the advice!

I received my copy of the Garrigues/Dean book today, and also a borrowed copy of Stiles/Skutch.  The Stiles/Skutch has a lot more text detail and when so many of the birds (even the families) are unfamiliar it can be handy to have lots of species per page, but for carrying with me, I'm happy with my choice.  Comparing the two side by side on the species I know, the illustrations in Garrigues/Dean appear more accurate and natural looking (as well as a lot bigger).

It'll be a my first trip there, so I don't have a very good sense of the geography.  We'll be on a package tour hitting a lot of the tourist spots: Rincon de la Vieja, the Arenal region, Cano Negro Wildlife Refuge, the Sarapiqui area, and a short time in Tortuguero. I don't expect to have time for special birding side trips, but I think there will be free time for walkabout birding in many of the places we find ourselves.

BB

[norman]

I've no idea if you're already down there, but perhaps you'll have time and access (things are pretty spread out in Guanacaste Province (formerly part of Nicaragua, but Nicaraqua gave it to CR -- no war or anything; just a handover. I forget the details.), but I'm assuming you're flying into Liberia. If the wacky airport is the same as it was ten years ago (It's processing as usual in a smallish federal building, but the waiting area up at the tarmac has the hugest thatch building I've ever seen -- when inside, I looked up. Two Barn Owls were looking down. A good omen, I thought).


Rincon de la Vieja ("corner/place of the old" is a reasonable translation) N.P. is amazing -- gangs of coatimundis pillaging the camping area, agoutis bouncing away in the tropical hardwood understory, cassowaries and guans hanging around ... if you see a mid-sized toucan, it's automatically a Collared Aracari by range; its similar counterpart, the Fiery-billed, is central and south. The big toucan is Keel-billed, again by range (and unmistakable plumage if they're just sitting around); the other large toucan farther south is the Chestnut-mandibled, usually being attacked by about 10 species of passerines -- they have a big appetite for eggs and nestlings ... well, you get the picture. I wish I'd studied ranges and similar species extensively before that first trip. Hope you don't mind very windy (always) and dry conditions. I went solo (my aunt was back in the mental hospital) in ''97 or was it '98 and hiked 12 hours a day for three days -- it's just the best place in the north for bird people. You'll love it. Do you have room (and enough colones) to hire me as your guide? I'd also require a GPS device implanted in my brain, or we'll all die. Think about it.

So have a great time, see lotsa feathers, and post a few reports here, so we can vicariously escape winter. Just a quick summary of how it's going ... please!

[Brian Bailey]

I posted some Costa Rica shots in the Photos section.

It was a great trip - too short - but fun.  The flycatchers can certainly be challenging, but the Woodcreepers!  Arrgh!  They could drive you to drink!

BB

[norman]

That's exactly what happened to me ... I got back to the lodge, and after viewing and re-viewing the plate in Skutch (he's a deity down in the central area about halfway up the Cerro de Muerte, where he live since 194_). I went down to the bar. I woke up in a (presumably) stolen shopping cart from a supermercado in Limon (the other coast ...), pantless, somewhere on the Nicoya Peninsula. I was covered in sand crabs, and really thirsty.

There are a few Woodcreepers Anonymous  groups down there: San Jose (it's after dark, so skip that one); a great one somewhere near Monteverde, and a new one in Cartago. Should have a "sponsor" to call when you go back. Maybe someone will start a group in Toronto.

Did you see any crested guans? Take a scalding sulphur bath at the park? Make it to the waterfall? (There's a nice video of the Pond of I Think I Can Hike All the Way Back Now.) Tell us more ... going to your photos.