Tropical Birding tour report: The Yucutan and Palenque
Just
when we thought the day
can’t get any better, we found
three
White Hawks along the road back to Palenque. These living ghosts are an
incredible sight against a backdrop of dark green rainforest.
7 Jan:
We
briefly birded some scrubby areas near Palenque at dawn and were
rewarded with
Violet Sabrewing, Yellow-billed Cacique, and Crimson-collared and
Passerini’s
Tanagers. Another brief stop in the Usumacinta marshes produced our two
targets: Black-collared Hawk and Jabiru. The rest of the day was spent
traveling, driving back to Canc??n and getting a ferry to
Cozumel.
8
Jan:
We
felt lucky today, finding all of Cozumel’s endemic species
(save the nearly
extinct thrasher) in under two hours! The first thing one notices about
birds
on Cozumel is how exceptionally common Black Catbirds and
Yucat??n Vireos are
here compared to the mainland. Cozumel Vireos scolded at us from the
undergrowth and proved to be quite common and confiding, providing very
nice
views of their odd orangey plumage. A fruiting vine attracted a small
flock of
Western Spindalis and “Cozumel” Banaquit. Caribbean
Dove and White-crowned
Pigeon also reminded us of the Caribbean nature of the island. The
grayish
endemic subspecies of Rufous-browed Peppershrike was very vocal and
cooperative; we found a few family groups. Cozumel Wren was easier than
expected as we found a couple without much trouble. Cozumel Emerald on
the
other hand was much tougher than it should have been, but we eventually
prevailed, finding a stunning male with long tail streamers. We also
found the
curiously resident subspecies of Blue-gray Gnatcatcher. On the way back
to the
car we found “Golden” Yellow Warblers and a very
cooperative Mangrove Cuckoo. |
