Cactuspillar

Whichever way you look at it, this is a weird beast, or plant, or creature, or vegetable... Cactus or caterpillar, you decide. It was photographed in Peru, home of the cactus, yet also home of the caterpillar...

Hoatzin in action

Surely one of the strangest birds in the world, the Hoatzin has four stomachs like a cow, has no keel on its breastbone, barks like a wheezy old man and can barely walk through the branches without falling off – using its wings for balance. The young have claws on their wings! The cliché is it's a modern Archeopteryx, but I think the A bird was probably more of a dashing ground runner. But anything would appear dashing alongside an Hoatzin... (digiscope video at Lago Lindo, Peru)

Purple Heron

This ginger beauty was a PBC tick for me (as well as most of the folk around here). The photos are nothing special (digiscoped, 6.9.07), but they show that it is a juvenile. It has spent the last few weeks at the Nene Washes, Cambridgeshire (and there is another juvenile lingering on the Ouse Washes also in the county at the moment).

Sloth

I love sloths (digiscope)

More Lago Lindo birds

Hoatzin (DSLR)


White-winged Swallow (digiscope)



Yellow-tufted Woodpecker (digiscope)

Palm Tanager – the ubiquitous. (digiscope)

Magpie Tanager (digiscope)

Common Tody-flycatcher (DSLR)

Turkey Vulture – the ubiquitous (DSLR)

Ring King Action

Ringed Kingfisher, Lago Lindo, Peru, 16.9.07 (DSLR)

King of the Tropics

Tropical Kingbird, Lago Lindo, 16.9.07 (digiscope)
One of the commonest birds you encounter, but you still have to get the shots...

More Tarapoto wildlife

Tamarin (digiscope)



Ferruginous Pygmy Owl (digiscope)


Black-fronted Nunbird (digiscope)



Spot-breasted Woodpecker (digiscope)

Chestnut-bellied Seedeater (digiscope)

Social Flycatcher (digiscope)

Black-billed Thrush (digiscope)

Rufous-collared Sparrow – perhaps the most widespread and common of Peru's birds? (digiscope)

World's smallest cat

I came across a feral family of kittens among some slabs of rock in the grounds of Puerto Palmeras lodge, Tarapoto, Peru. The kitten on the left was about as small a kitten as I have ever seen, but the one on the right was minuscule in the extreme!

Tarapoto, pre-supper birds, Day 1

Canary-winged Parakeets

Blue Dacnis

Great Kiskadee

Spot-breasted Woodpecker
All digiscoped in the grounds of Puerto Palmeras, 14.9.07.

Peru early days

Eared Dove outside my hotel room at the Costa del Sol Ramada (barely three months old) overlooking Lima airport car-park. At this stage I wasn't really sure where I was going or when, so entertained myself watching the thousands of Pacific Doves and lesser numbers of Eareds plus distant Feral Pigeos. The odd Black Vulture added Neotropical charm.

Ice cream at Lima airport. The green sludge top left is really called Machu Picchu.

Waiting at arrivals at Lima.

Waiting for loved ones at Lima.

Bird welcoming committee, Black Vulture, Puerto Palmeras, Tarapoto.

Lima was gloomy, overcast and cool. Tarapoto, an hour's flight north and east was strikingly hot and humid and alive. I was immediately struck also by the motortaxis which are motobike tricycle taxis, completely dominating the roads in a land with very few private cars. At Puerto Plameras I met the owner Dr Carlos Gonzalez and my Prom Peru contact Omar Carbajal, plus Anahi Plenge of Ultimate Voyages. Her husband Rob Williams would be my guide later (and her father is Peru's most famous bird photographer, Heinz Plenge).
Time for a quick bird around the grounds before the rest of the bird fair crew arrive, I think...

Bathtime

Purple-collared Woodstars come down to bathe at the tiny pool connecting ponds at the lodge at Chaparri, northern Peru. (digiscoped video)

Spot-throated Hummingbird

More digiscoping fun...

Royal Sunangel

For those not yet convinced by the Power of Digiscoping, here is a (clickable) shot of a very rare and very localised hummer on what is often (probably erroneously) called the Abra Patricia, Peru (20.9.07).