November 4 - February 8 -- Final Trinidad Photos, LA For The Holidays, And Home..For Awhile

There's lots of time to cover in this post, so less writing and more photos. First off, let's finally get the Trinidad trip finished.. 

One of the naturalists at Asa Wright, Yosanna, showing her pet boa constrictor.

David Sibley sketching on the verandah (photo courtesy of Carol Comeau)

Asa Wright's groundskeeper Mukesh and the grounds he keeps

The final tour of my stay at Asa Wright was to Caroni Swamp, famous for its fly-in for the night by thousands of Scarlet Ibis. 

A closeup of one of the stars of the show

Part of the fly-in for the night

The island roost at Caroni Swamp

Cheers with the requisite rum punch for a successful tour! 

And I finally have a up close and personal encounter with a Bearded Bellbird. 

OK -- Now that we finally got the memorable stay at Trinidad's Asa Wright done, it's back home to Portal. On December 7th we finally had snow, though it melted by the afternoon. I was glad I took photos otherwise no one would have believed me. This was at our Cave Creek Canyon Visitor Info Center, where I'm one of the volunteers. 

A photo of the moon setting over one of the Cave Creek Canyon "monoliths"

While volunteering at our visitor center a fellow came in, saying two hikers said they'd seen an Elegant Trogon up South Fork. The following day I decided to take a look, carrying my 500mm lens. The autumn scenes were still, well, autumnal...  

And dang if I didn't get the male Elegant Trogon. In full sunlight, with a fall color backdrop. And you can see why they used to be called Coppery tailed Trogons. This is the best photo I've ever taken of a Trogon -- and probably ever will. 

The sunrises on the eastern side of the Chiricahuas hadn't lost their "wow" factor ---

There's at least one Northern Harrier that's a regular at Willow Tank. Here"She" was being blown about by the wind, but the 500mm lens managed to catch her banking and in full wing spread.

Hey, it really is winter here!  It's December 18, and the high Chiricahuas have a thin cover of snow. 

Even the formation called "The Fingers" looked brooding, like the "Lord of the Rings"'s Mountains of Mordor. 

Then it was time for my usual holiday trip to visit my dad. And the usual traffic; this is on the 91 freeway going through Riverside. 

The sunrises at the Los Angeles port town of San Pedro could be just as spectacular as the ones back home at Portal.

Harbor Park, across from the Kaiser Hospital where I worked for 34 years (really?) was recently re-opened after being closed for 2 years for rehabilitation and renovation. It's really improved and been cleaned up, and had a good variety of birds; here's a male Common Yellowthroat. Though it was always one of the birdiest spots in southern California, I can see it becoming even better than before -- so long as it doesn't get trashed as it previously was. 

I returned home to Portal in early January. I've always wanted to get a good quality photo of a Ferruginous Hawk, so I went across the border to New Mexico and cruised up and down the agricultural fields near Cotton City.  I saw this beautiful juvenile on a power pole. 

There has been an irruption of Cassin's Finches in the area; they've been seen in lower-elevation locations. As friends had seen them at their feeders, I thought they'd missed my back yard until this female showed up. 

Three of us Portalites have started a "500 Club", where we each have a 500mm lens. We took a day outing to Whitewater Draw on the west side of the Chiricahuas. Whitewater is famous for its wintering Sandhill Cranes, which in some years has reached 20,000 and more. On this day our 500mm lenses proved useful as the cranes were further away from the viewing path. 

The majesty of the Sandhill Crane -- though they do have muddy feet. 

And we saw two Vermilion Flycatchers at Whitewater, both males -- a juvenile and and this one, an adult. 

So this being They Year of Travel, I'm currently on a mesa south of Overton, Nevada, boondocking (off the grid) with my travel trailer. But that's for the next post.. 

October 24 - November 3 --- A Stay At Trinidad's Asa Wright Nature (Part 3) -- The Tour Outings and David Sibley

It was hard to tear myself away from the verandah at Asa Wright; the birds are right there in front of  you and it was like shooting fish in a barrel. For once, THEY came to YOU. But even just outside of my room in one of the cottages there were plenty of photo-ops -- 

Copper-rumped hummingbird preening

Female Tufted Coquette (I struck out on the spectacular male)

The first official tour I went on was an evening drive to the abandoned United States airfield at Wallerfield. The airstrips and roads are still there and it's in one of the few remaining natural savannahs in Trinidad, so in its overgrown state birding can be very productive. Here's our van going down one of airstrips --

As the evening descended into night, we began looking looking for nightjars. "Look!  There's eyeshine on the side of the road!" Nope, it was just a reflection off a soda can. But we did see some good birds, including Common Potoo, which we spotted on a post --

The following day back at Asa Wright there was a very cooperative female Barred Antshrike at the reception area --

And here's a bird that we're familar with in the US -- a female Blackpoll Warbler --

The view from the verandah down the Ariva Valley at sunrise never stays the same...And I recommend you get to the verandah at 6am for not only the view but the coffee.

The second tour I went on (there were two groups staying at Asa Wright along with a few independent travellers; I was the photographer for Caligo and my friend and fellow Portalite Carol was the host/coordinator) was a day exploring the Northern mountain range along Blanchisseuse Road. The original forecast for my Trinidad stay was for continuous rain coming from the east, but that thankfully didn't happen, and I only had to protect my camera equipment on this one day. But a little rain isn't enough to stop birders --

The skies cleared up by noon when we spent some time at the visitor center in the mountain village of Brasso Seco. We were shown some of the local specialties, such as how smoked meats are made using an indigenous cooking facility -- 

Then we tried a local meal of smoked chicken, rice, beans, taro root, corn pie, and cacao ice cream.

After lunch we were shown the steps in processing both coffee and cacao and sampled each -- 

And finally, I took a photo of the tour group. 

After being stuffed with local food, we headed back up the mountain for an afternoon of birding. It didn't take us very to long to see a rufous-tailed Jacamar on a wire --

Blue-headed parrots --

A Common Black Hawk, which was a Lifer for me even though they can be seen back home in the Chiricahuas.

But the sighting that was really special was a group of Swallow Tanagers; it turned out to be a Life Bird for everyone in the group -- including a well-known name in the birding world who you may hae recognized in a few of the previous photos. It's what made our sighting really special, and now I can say I share a Lifer with...

David Sibley. 

Yes, THAT David Sibley. He was there with his wife Joan Walsh as part of Asa Wright's 50th anniversary.  The photo above shows him with Barry Ramdass, one of the interpreter/guides; Barry had David autograph his copy of the Sibley's Guide To Birds. David is quiet and unassuming and though he did a few presentations on sketching and IDing birds, it didn't take long for the other tour members to think of he and Joan as just birders on a tour that his main focus was to draw and see the wonders of Trinidad. Still, he WAS David Sibley...

The next day, October 31, would be prove to be one of the highlights of my stay in Trinidad. Dunston Cave is one of the most accessible caves in the world for the rare Oilbird, and it's on the grounds of Asa Wright. Oilbirds are the only nocturnal, fruit-eating birds in the world, and access is strictly controlled to protect them. So there we were, on the trail to see the Oilbirds, when someone shouted "there's an ornate hawk-eagle!" They're beautiful raptors, and and sometimes it takes years for birders to see them -- and I saw one on my first tropical birding trip.

It's hard to top seeing an ornate hawk-eagle, but the Oilbirds did.

There are about 170 oilbirds in Dunston Cave, and to reach the cave -- it's actually more of a grotto --you go down a pathway that has handrails in slippery spots; I remember thinking that I was glad I didn't bring my 500mm lens with me. Near the entrance to the cave the path goes across the convergence of two streams --

Then you come to the cave.

The oilbirds are on natural shelves on the cave's walls. No flash photography is allowed, but Caleb Walker, the senior guide at Asa Wright,  used a flashlight to briefly illuminate them for getting a quick picture. 

Coming up: Nariva Swamp and the Scarlet Ibis..