Blue Eyed Birder: Brazil with Bird's Wildlife & Nature

Monday 23 October 2023

Brazil with Bird's Wildlife & Nature - 11th June 2023

Dawn on the flash at Piuval saw sun up with Roseate Spoonbills, still active Nacunda Nighthawks and noisy Hyacinth Macaws while hundreds of Snail Kites drifted off for the day hunting Apple Snails.

Amazing how the light changes

Roseate Spoonbills,

Our pre-breakfast visit to the end of the entrance drive gave us our best views of Campo Flickers and Red-shouldered Macaws leaving their roost but Giant Anteaters eluded us. Grassland Sparrows hopped up on the fenceline and Chotoy Spinetails and Rufous Woodcreeper showed very well.

Campo Flickers

Yellow-choevroned Parakeets

Grassland Sparrow

Back at the lodge the Rheas were panicking at getting their feet wet again and some stalking gave us good views of fizzy singing Yellowish Pipits, White Headed Water-Tyrants and our first Eared Dove. A pair of White-eyed Parakeets posed on the eaves of the lodge and Orange-winged Parrots moved off to feed. It was a lovely finale.

Eduardo tracking Pipits

Greater Rhea

Bare Faced Ibis

Great White Egret

Hyacinth Macaw

Black Skimmer

Nacunda Nighthawks

Yellowish Pipit

White Headed Water-Tyrant

Eared Dove - the 1st - we would seen dozens on the road east but only as we zoomed by

Long-tailed Ground Dove

Saffron Finch

Vermillion Flycatcher - magnificent

White-eyed Parakeets

Peach-fronted and Monk Parakeets

and the only Snake we saw on the whole trip

Breakfast and then back onto the Transpantaneira for the last time as we began the long journey back to Cuiaba and then onwards through the frankly bleak industrial mega-scale farmland where not too long ago Amazonian rainforest stood. There were almost no birds to be seen but by mid-afternoon we were in the remnant of Atlantic forest in which sits the Jardim do Amazonia – our lodge for the final three days.

Back on the tarmac

Depressing

The rest of that day was a bit of a blur with a couple of walks through the dry jungle opening our eyes to a completely different suite of species. Almost everything was new and it was like being dropped into an almost completely different country with Red-bellied Macaws, Chapman’s and Short-tailed Swifts, Swallow-winged Puffbird, Black Girdled Barbets, Red-necked Aracaris, the mighty Ringed Woodpecker, Point Tailed Palmcreepers, miniscule Short-tailed Pygmy-Tyrants, Drab Water-Tryants, silky blue-back White-banded Swallows, Black-necked and Turquoise Tanagers, Black-faced Dacnis with piercing yellow eyes, singing Hauxwell’s Thrush, Epaulet Orioles (the other half of Variable) and cackling Speckled Chachalacas – and breath. None of us even had a book that covered this cascade of feathers.