The title of this post takes a long time getting there, but Bill is in the name of our recent yard resident. Ten months ago I asked Dennis, our good friend and neighbor, to help me suspend a tray feeder. I tied off a clothesline high and between some pine trees while standing on his long extension ladder. I wanted to lure some more reticent members of our community to savor the delights of ripe bananas.
This past week we finally saw the Keel-billed Toucan that has been calling for weeks in our neighborhood. He is a wary one. It would appear that by size alone he could dominate, but instead, there are many minutes of watchful waiting until the tray is clear of competition before he makes a move. Now I hope the other customers leave some scraps for the new visitor. And of course, I pile on extra to help.
Along with the wait, there is a long period of croaking as he sizes up the situation, as the video shows. And I consider him a "he" based on the racket. He could only be advertising the bounty for a suitable mate.
When Cindy and I drive up and down the hill here on errands, we often see small flocks of Ruddy Ground-Doves milling about in the road near the chicken fincas. But, they occur only down lower, at the guard station and below. We have been hoping to spy one of these cute things in our yard, which is just a few hundred feet higher. Note: As Bob Behrstock says, they are high on the Cuteness Scale.
After two years of waiting and hoping, we have our first! He likes the cracked corn I diligently scatter in the driveway and yard for the grassquits, seedeaters and other doves. Now, we hope he encourages some friends to join him in his foraging.
The video leads off with the Ruddy and then presents other recent yard birds and critters. In quick succession, there are Long-billed Starthroat, Lineated Woodpecker, Keel-billed Toucan, a furry thingy (I probably accidentally touched something similar last month and my left mitt swelled up large enough to catch a softball), and a sloth of the three-toed variety.
Panama Audubon hosts a Christmas pot-luck dinner every December where the upcoming bird counts for the season are described. Cindy and I are in our third year of enjoying the Christmas Bird Counts here in Panama.
We've already completed the Pacific Count which must have been the best ever, at least for us. Our assignment was to walk the Old Gamboa Road to the north, which has been off-limts due to the canal operations. With our authorization letter in my pocket we walked the forested road to more open habitat.
There were a couple of houses and some barking dogs which didn't mind us as we counted birds. There was nothing rare to report, but it was an excellent, mild day (it had rained the entire night before) and we finished with 93 species. Our companions were Alfred Raab from Altos del Maria and Paul Roth (search for his name in this article) from Switzerland. They are both top-notch birders and the four of us made an efficient team. This area of Old Gamboa Road holds a lot of allure for us and we hope to return.
Back at the pot-luck dinner earlier in the week, this year's winners of the annual photo contest were introduced. As you would guess, they are all active birders and talented field photographers. The winners are:
1st Place - Jan Axel found a Cinnamon Woodpecker foraging on a fallen truck and got the image.
2nd Place - Ralph Dessau captured a Scintillant Hummingbird on a nest.
3rd Place - Rafael Luck stopped the wing stretch of a Royal Tern.
Honorable Mention - Celeste Paiva took a short pause with a Volcano Hummingbird.
All are wonderful photos and we want to see more. In fact, I am lobbying for there to be a gallery showing of all the submitted photos for the year. That would make for a fine evening!
The video below gives a "taste" of the dinner and the awards.
Cindy and I don't get to Pipeline Road as much as we said we wanted to and vowed that we would. Our yard in Los Altos de Cerro Azul is too enjoyable. But, we made a date on a day trip to the city. The afternoon was for errands and recycling, and the morning was for BIRDS!
At the ammo ponds, Smooth-billed Anis were a welcoming sight. As always, we heard the descending, rattling chuuurrr call of the White-throated Crake. Near the entrance to Pipeline we spotted Nando, the former caretaker of Birder's View, now a guide for Canopy Tower. He was guiding two women from New Mexico and they were looking at a White-tailed Trogon.
For something different, we didn't drive all the way to the closed gate on Pipeline Road, but stopped at the always-open entrance gate and walked the first two kilometers. There is always plenty to see in this stretch. Several Western-Slaty Antshrikes made their usual appearance - they're always very cooperative. And I was able to audio record the "caw" call we hear them also make in our yard. Today was filled with common birds, but still held some surprises, including the hand lettered sign seen above.
We assume the sign poster was concerned about Bullet Ants. There were none visible for us that day. A column of leaf cutters was at work a short distance down the road. The "soldiers" had large mandibles and very light-colored heads. I couldn't resist trying to video their activities. The speed of the little critters is very impressive and, as you will see, makes it very difficult to keep them in the frame.
Birders keep a lot of checklists. We put little check marks next to bird names in a huge variety, such as life lists, yard lists and bucket lists. Well, perhaps we don't all have bucket lists, but there are birds we are dying to see. One of those wouldn't normally be the Turkey Vulture. But, after a day trip to Lake Bayano I feel like starting a bucket list and putting a big check next to TV migration.
One of four species of vultures in Panama, large numbers of TVs move through Panama in October and November and again in February to April. The birds are concentrated in an area of the country that can be as narrow as 36 miles. On the 27th of October 2011, the hawk watch on Ancon Hill in Panama City logged a new one-day record of 893,783 raptors!
We have seen Turkey Vultures in California, of course, and they are a feature of the Kern River Valley AUTUMN NATURE & VULTURE FESTIVAL. One of many facts I've learned is that a group of Turkey Vultures roosting is called a Wake.
The birds over Lake Bayano weren't waiting around to have a name put on them. They were making time! The video shows them climbing up the thermals and heading towards South America. A very few Swainson's Hawks were sprinkled in the flocks.
The best intro to the video would be by Robert Ridgely in A Guide to Birds of Panama. "A masterful flyer, soaring for long periods without a flap, tilting from side to side to take advantage of every favorable air current....large (sometimes tremendous) flocks of migrants breeding in north pass overhead, providing the observer who is in the right place at the right time with a breathtaking spectacle..."
White-tipped Sicklebill is a much sought after species here in Cerro Azul, although it also inhabits other areas of Panamá, Costa Rica and northern parts of South America. So, it's not one of the 12 or so endemic species in Panama, but still a prize.
A few days ago, with our North American amigo Jorge, we visited a local heliconia grove with the hope of seeing a sicklebill. We've seen them several times at this location. Sometimes it's just a fly-by, and it always feels like a bonus if one of them hovers for even a few seconds at a flower or in front of our faces to check us out. This time, a sicklebill was sitting for several minutes on a vine just a few feet off the ground, no more than 20 feet from us. I managed some video in the shadows. Pollen is visible on the bird's crown. We watched it resting and preening, until a tree limb fell noisily behind us and the bird took flight. This interlude made our day and was a delight.
Cindy and I are not usually concerned about the weather affecting our activities. Our nonchalance could be explained because we haven’t been overly troubled by it, ever. Except for the blinding snow storm on a car trip to make the Denver airport and, it turns out, the last flight out. But, we made it. Weather has now made an impression.
The Bird Watcher’s Digest Big Sit was held on Oct 9, 2011. And that’s right in the middle of the rainy season in the Republic of Panamá. Last year we managed 49 species and we were hoping to better that this year. But, the weather had it’s way. The day started out sloppy and it stayed that way, with overcast skies, fog, wind, and rain. Not conducive to adding anything new.
Even seeing some of the common species proved difficult. Bay-headed Tanagers didn’t make an appearance at our well-stocked feeders. The only bird in flight against the gray skies was a Turkey Vulture. That was a very sore point for me, since I was hoping to see some migrant raptors. But, don't get me wrong, some fine birds did make a pass through the yard, including the endemic Stripe-cheeked Woodpecker, seen in the video below. We also managed 6 species of wood-warblers, and one each of grosbeak and oriole.
Our confining 17-foot diameter circle was positioned to gain a look skyward, as well as to various strategically placed bananas and a couple of catastrophic seed spills. The observer must be inside the circle while seeing a bird for it to count. We took that to mean that only one foot need be inside the border. This lead to some helpful leaning, this way and that. I am reminded of the Hays Code where the unfortunate actors were required to contort their bodies while in bed and keep one foot on the floor. But, interestingly during the Big Sit, if you see a bird from within the circle you can leave it to clinch the ID. And I suppose that includes hearing a bird and leaving the circle to get the identification.
The video contains a few of the birds seen during our Big Sit. If you enjoy identifying on your own, the video captions with the bird names can be switched off and on by clicking on the red/white box in the bottom frame.
The final species list is shown below the video as a report from eBird.
Casita Naranja Oct 9, 2011 5:45 AM - 5:45 PM Protocol: Stationary Comments: 65-67 degrees F, breezy, intermittent drizzle, occasional light rain, fog drifting in & out, heavy cloud cover with no sun or blue skies all day 43 species
