Yucatan Birding Trip

Saturday

Leaving the Yucatan

This has been one of the best birding trips we have ever taken. The people on the Yucatan peninsula have been very friendly and welcoming. They left us alone for the most part. Robert and I added so many new Life Birds to our Life List that we had never seen before. Mexico will always be at the top of our list of places to bird.

We touched down in Memphis, Tennessee around 5pm and got the sad news that our 17 year old dog, Rocky, was at the Emergency Animal Hospital having constant seizures. We rushed to the hospital where we saw Rocky for one last time before he died. We were able to be with him and comfort him as Rocky was put to sleep by the Vet. We will miss Rocky a lot.

Below is a Trip List of all 114 birds that we saw during our three weeks in Mexico in 2006. We are quite proud of this compilation of birds.

Robert and Berry

photo courtesy of wikipedia

Friday

Xian Ka'an Biosphere Reserve

This is our last day in the Yucatan and it is raining. We took off and drove 3 miles down a wet and bumpy gravel road to the Sian Ka'an Biosphere Reserve. This is a very large wilderness area right along the coast, with miles of very remote, uninhabited Caribbean beaches. Sian Ka'an is Mayan for "Where the Sky is Born". The Reserve is a great resource for bird watchers. The rain kept us inside the car.

We turned toward Punta Allen, a Mayan fishing village inside the Reserve. There were massive mangrove swamps, which beckoned to the fisherman inside us everyone. We ate lunch at one of the cute little restaurants along the beachfront. There is a dock on the lagoon with a thatched palm palapa roof. From this dock, we saw an Osprey (Pandion haliaetus) in her nest, but we did not see any baby Osprey. Additionally we saw both the Acorn Woodpecker (Melanerpes formicivorus) and Ladder Backed Woodpecker (Picoides scalaris).

Exhausted, we drove to Cancun where we will finish our vacation. We ate dinner in a nice restaurant, then found a hotel room, close to the airport. We slowly packed all of our birding gear, birding books, dirty clothes, and several souvenirs in preparation for tomorrow's flight back to the States.

Robert and Berry

photo courtesy of wikipedia

Thursday

Coba and its Lakes

Coba is a huge Mayan site less than two hours from Playa del Carmen. It is different from the other big sites we have seen in the Yucatan. First of all, it's situated next to four natural lakes. Lakes themselves are rare sights in the Yucatan. The city's name, Coba, means "Waters Stirred by Wind" in Mayan. We saw that it is not as heavily excavated, nor reconstructed, as many of the ruins we have seen on this trip. At Coba a number of large structures are still covered with jungle growth. Fresh water lakes and heavy jungle growth make this for us a perfect birding location.

It was in the tangled undergrowth we were fortunate to see a Grey Headed Tanager (Eucometis Penicillata). These secretive birds have yellowish-olive plumage over much of its body with a conspicuous gray head. We watched this one forage for insects for several minutes among the ferns and vines.

One of the more interesting features of Coba is the ancient Sacbe, stone paved roads built by the Mayans. The Mayans built a network of roads through the Yucatan peninsula, connecting their major cities. The roads go through dense jungle in perfectly straight lines. They are built with walled sides like curbs. The Mayans made the roads about 10 meters wide, probably for ceremonial purposes. In the Coba area there are about 40 sacbes, some of them heading deep into the jungle.

We ate lunch at one of the local restaurants by the lake. They have excellent traditional food and we like to support small, off-the-beaten-track, family places.

As we were making our way slowly back to our hotel in Playa del Carmen, we stopped to visit the "Grand Cenote", with its stalactites and stalagmites. Stalactites hold tight to the ceiling of caves and stalagmites might reach the ceiling. Tourists can swim and snorkel in this large cenote.

On the forest floor we saw a Grey-breasted Wood Wren (Henicorhina Leucophrys). He was busily thrashing around in the leaves on the ground.

Before we got back to the hotel, it started to rain. We stayed another night at Playa del Carmen at the Hotel Maria Bonita.

Robert and Berry

photos courtesy of wikipedia

Wednesday

Tulum

This morning after getting a new rental car, we were moving around more easily. We are traveling up the southern side of the Yucatan peninsula, and the further east we went, the more tourists.

Our first destination was the small seaside fishing village of Majahual, near the Belize frontier. Cruise ships often dock at the port in Majahual. This does not usually make for good birding because of all the people and the noise. There are small shops on the beach selling touristy trinkets and thing-a-ma-bobs. We walked along the beach, painfully aware of the tourists next to us, then quickly left this scene and headed east toward Tulum.

Tulum was originally the summer house of the Mayan emperor and managed to survive intact, until about 70 years after the Spanish Conquista of Mexico. Tulum is a popular place for tourists. A large number of cenotes are located in the Tulum area and this is where we birded. Cenotes are sources of fresh drinking water and often have interesting birds around them. At the cenote Tortuga, we saw a beautiful Mangrove Swallow (Tachycineta Albilinea). The bird's plumage is black with a green-blue gloss. A characteristic feature that distinguishes the Mangrove Swallow from other white-rumped swallows is the small white spot in front of its eyes. This was another Life Bird for us. To celebrate the sighting of the Mangrove Swallow, we ate lunch in Tulum with all the tourists we had left earlier.

On the way to Playa del Carmen, among the birds we saw were a Plain Chachalaca (Ortalis Vetula), a Lesser Yellow-headed Vulture (Cathartes Burrovianus), and our old friend, the Magnificent Frigatebird (Fregata Magnificens). We are beginning to feel tired of toting around all our earthly posessions in bags. We ate a sumptious dinner and stayed the night at the Hacienda Maria Bonita in Playa del Carmen.

Robert and Berry

photo courtesy of wikipedia

Tuesday

Chetumal on the "Day of the Dead"

After a long, hot day and night yesterday, we were ready to relax and do a few personal errands in the relatively modern city of Chetumal. Today is a national holiday here in Mexico, el Dia de los Muertos, the "Day of the Dead".

This holiday focuses on family and friends, with the ultimate intention of praying for and remembering those who have died. The day-long celebration takes place in connection with the Catholic holiday of All Saints Day and All Souls Day. Celebrants go to local cemeteries and build private altars containing the favorite foods of the departed. These shenanigans can take a humorous tone, as celebrants remember funny events and anecdotes about the dead.

Because of the holiday, all the banks were closed, as well as the rental car agencies. We could not rent another car until tomorrow, nor could we exchange money at the bank. So, first we washed our clothes at the hotel. Because we really needed to get some money, we walked to the local currency exchange office and stood in two long lines. After lunch, we visited the Museo de la Cultura Maya, a sophisticated interactive museum dedicated to the complex world of the Mayans. One of the displays was the three-storied Sacred Ceiba Tree, a symbol used by the Maya to explain the relationship between the cosmos and the earth.

Late in the afternoon, we walked to the ocean and watched fishermen bring in their nets. We ate dinner at a restaurant on the beach. Finally, we took a taxi back to the hotel. We were tired of walking.

Tomorrow we will resume birding in Mexico.

Robert and Berry

photo courtesy of wikipedia

Monday

Calakmul, deep in the Jungle

Today we visited the Calakmul Biosphere Reserve (Reserva de la Biosfera de Calakmul) located in the western part of the Yucatan Peninsula in the state of Campeche, bordering the Guatemalan "department" of El Petén to the south. The Reserve is slightly larger than the state of Deleware and includes about 12% of the jungles of Mexico. Calakmul, which was established in 1989, is one of the largest protected areas in Mexico. During the Mayan ascendence, Calakmul was one of the largest and most powerful ancient cities ever uncovered in the Yucatan. The Reserve is a treasure trove of Mayan history. It contains the remains of roughly 1000 ancient structures.

Calakmul in Mayan means "the city of two adjacent pyramids". Robert climbed to the top of one of the pyramids, which peeked just above the treetops. The spectacular view of the surrounding jungle, a huge green carpet stretching for miles, interrupted only by other Mayan edifices peeking up and out of the jungle. The Reserve has incredible biodiversity, including panthers. Calakmul's bat caves are home to around 3.5 million bats that emerge every night to forage for insects.

We saw many of the same species of birds that we had seen all around the Yucatan peninsula, however a new bird to us today was the Bat Falcon (Falco rufigularis). We were sitting down in the shade, resting after Robert's climb to the top of one of the pyramids. I was looking around and spotted the Bat Falcon high in a tree behind us. Its breast is barred black and white and its belly is orange. This bird resembled a little gentleman in an orange-red sweater with a small black waistcoat perched in a tree. Very cute. We watched him through the spotting scope for several minutes. Bat Falcons launch aerial attacks on their prey from conspicuous perches. They hunt bats, small birds and large insects such as dragonflies.

As we were driving down the gravel road to leave the Reserve, we dodged a car coming toward us in a curve. Our radiator was damaged. Berry waited for the tow truck at La Selva Restaurante. Cell phones being useless in the jungle, Robert went to search for the only landline telephone in the town. All was well in the end. The tow truck picked us up and drove us to the much larger city of Chetumal. Exhausted at this point, we were thrilled to see the Holiday Inn in Chetumal, where we stayed the night. It was "el Dia de los Muertos", the "Day of the Dead" in Mexico, like our Halloween.

Robert and Berry

photo courtesy of wikipedia

Sunday

Driving to Calakmul

This morning we slept late, (...hey, we are on vacation) left the fabulous royal complex of Palenque, and headed into the jungle lowlands near Guatemala. Today was mainly a driving day, but even on driving days, we see birds. Today in Mexico we saw several Life Birds along the way. Three of the most remarkable ones were the Pale Billed Woodpecker (Campephilus guatemalensis), the Great Curassow (Crax rubra), and the Ocellated Turkey (Meleagris ocellata).

Woodpeckers are one of our favorite birds. We have several in our back yard at home and we keep suet out for them all winter. When we saw a large woodpecker on the side of a tree, we immediately thought of our Pileated Woodpecker (Dryocopus pileatus) in the southern United States. The Pale Billed Woodpecker (Campephilus guatemalensis) is one of the most spectacular woodpeckers in Central America. It is a large, black and white woodpecker with a crested, red head. The heavy bill is ivory or yellowish white. The Pale Billed Woodpecker is the only surviving member of the Campephilus woodpecker family. The other birds in that scientific family were the Ivory Billed Woodpecker (Campephilus principalis), last seen in Arkansas and the Imperial Woodpecker ((Campephilus imperialis), last seen in Mexico. These two are most probably extinct.

As our drive continued, we spotted a large, pheasant-like bird, foraging on the ground. It was a Great Currassow (Crax rubra). Diagnostic characteristics of this bird are a tousled crest of forward-curling feathers that adorn the length of its crown and its vivid yellow bill with a bulbous yellow knob at the base. Its plumage is predominantly black, faintly glossed with a purple glow. Its belly and under-tail coverts are white. While trying to identify the Great Currassow, we learned that they have long lifespans (up to 24 years!) and low rates of reproduction.

Finally in the late afternoon, on the side of the road, we saw a male Ocellated Turkey (Meleagris ocellata) strutting to show off his beautiful feathers. There are only two species of turkey in the world. The North American Wild Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) up north and the Ocellated Turkey. The Ocellated Turkey lives only in the Yucatan Peninsula.

After a long day of driving, we stopped for the night in the city of Xpujil and stayed at the Hotel Calakmul. Tomorrow, we are going to explore the vast jungle reachs of the Calakmul Biosphere Reserve.

Robert and Berry

photo courtesy of lynxeds