After a 6am breakfast we visited the Jocotoco Foundations Yunguilla Reserve, just a 15 minute uphill drive from our hotel. We walked down a track for a good half an hour to a feeding station where the ranger we’d brought with us from town placed some food out. Even before this we’d laid eyes on the mega Pale-headed Brushfinch and whilst food was being put out a pair of Grey-browed Brushfinches perched right next to the ranger! Anyway, we had great views of both brushfinches, as well as a Chestnut-crowned Antpitta that also lingered around the feeding station.
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| Pale-headed Brushfinch |
But it was Pale-headed Brushfinch we’d come to admire and weren’t disappointed with at least two individuals coming frequently to feed. With no more than 300 individuals in the 36km2 area this is a rare bird and classified as Vulnerable by BirdLife International. We enjoyed watching the feeding activity and remained here for a couple of hours, during which time Black-crested Warbler, Line-cheeked Spinetail, Rufous-chested Tanagerand a pair of Slaty-backed Nightingale-Thrushes also appeared. A walk around the reserve resulted in very brief Azara’s Spinetail and a perched female Purple-collared Woodstar.
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| Purple-collared Woodstar |
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| Our happy group at Yunguilla |
So we returned to the minibus and then had a little time off back at the hotel before lunch. We were away and on the road by 1.15pm and heading to Umbrellabird Lodge located in the fantastic Buenaventura Reserve – another jewel in the Jocotoco Foundation’s string of reserves, where we arrived at 4.30pm. After placing our luggage into the very nice cabins we headed out 45 minutes later to try and see the umbrellabirds but we were too late.
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| Black-and-white Owl |
So we had another nice dinner and enjoyed a fine Black-and-white Owl in the spotlight before retiring to our cabins by 8.15pm to prepare for a very early start to the paramo tomorrow morning for one of the rarest birds on the planet.
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