San Gerardo Field Station is a well-maintained but rustic lodge near the Santa Elena Cloud Forest Preserve. From Santa Elena, a nearly impassable dirt road winds down to the lodge and the adjoining trails. You must walk the 2.4 kilometers and bring a pack if you're staying several nights. The lodge has bathrooms in every bunk-style room, but there is electricity only from 6 am to 9 pm. All food is cooked on the premises by a cook and it's generally quite good. No alcohol is served.

Here is a Video of the hummingbird galleries at the Waterfall Gardens.

There are not a lot of accommodations around this park, but it's not a difficult drive from places around La Selva or even San Jose. Most of the Braulio Carillo birding sites are only at a 500-700 meter elevation, making it an interesting ecological zone for overlapping lowland species.

Since Virgen Del Soccoro has been made inaccessible because of the 2009 earthquake, Braulio Carrillo National Park now has become one of the most centralized locations for Caribbean foothill birding and perhaps the easiest access to that habitat from San Jose. There are several species at this mid-level elevation which may prove hard to get at other parks and reserves including Black-and-Yellow Tanager and Lattice-tailed Trogon.

Rancho Naturalista is a superb birding lodge approximately 3 hours south of San Jose. Hummingbird feeders on the public porch balcony produce at least 8-10 species within the first 15 minutes of your arrival. By the end of 3 days - the recommended time frame for visitors - one should have at least 15 species of hummingbirds including the uncommon Snowcap. On my stay in early July (a more difficult time to bird) we had about 115 species including Dull-mantled Antbird, Checker-throated Antwren, Russet Antshrike, Buff-throated Foliage-gleaner, Long-tailed and Wedge-billed Woodcreepers, Tawny-chested Flycatcher, Rufous Mourner, Olive Tanager, three species of euphonias, and a wide selection of other birds. An adjoining side trip to the Tuis Valley is a good place for Sunbittern and Fasciated Tiger-Heron. We also were treated to an unexpected pair of Crested Owls and at least two Black-crested Coquettes. The very rare Lanceloated Monklet (which will show up on a few trip reports) should not be expected but is infrequently seen if one takes a field trip to the Tuis Valley.

Your stay at Rancho may seem costly at first, but when you add in the fact that you're getting 3 good meals a day, a good room, and a very good personal bird guide (for us it was a guide for two people), then it really turns out to be a bit of a bargain. The birding is very good, and the feeders are stocked three times a day.

Bird guides at Rancho are now pay-as-you-go. Rancho reduced it's rate recently to allow guides to handle guest requests independently. See the Rancho site for costs.

When you weigh the relatively small number of good birding lodges in the American tropics, Rancho Naturalista is a special experience for birders. It's not easy for individuals who are not with a tour group to reach the property, and it does require it's own time frame. Because of this, it's not on everyone's itinerary. Still, if you can add the days to your itinerary, it will almost certainly reward you with good memories.

Savegre Lodge is just south of San Jose on the south side of Cerro de la Muerte. The lodge is nested in a gorgeous valley at about 2200 meters. The large stands of oaks and protected cloud forest habitat make it an exceptional location to see high-elevation birds.

Birds like Timberline Wren and Wrenthrush are not generally found on the grounds, but they can be found at scattered locations a little higher up - just off the highway if you have a guide or perhaps at Parisio de Quetzal which is down the road a few kilometers (see "A Bird-finding Guide to Costa Rica").

Santa Rosa National Park is mostly a dry woodland habitat with nice gallery forest areas - some evergreen. The park is a large park north of Liberia. One particular trail that follows an old impassable dirt road not far the entrance is especially good. Long-tailed Manakin, Barred Antshrike, Western Slaty Antshrike, and several Rufous-

capped Warblers were seen along this trail. A variety of good deciduous forest birds can be found here. We also found Nutting's Flycatcher, specific to Guanacaste only and a troubling identification problem, within this park at another location. Some of the largest iguana lizards in Costa Rica are also found here.

If you're staying somewhere in Guanacaste, your best chance at bird diversity is visiting the mountains along the cordillera east of the Pan American Highway. One of the easiest ways to see birds of the Caribbean slope from Guanacaste is to simply drive the road to Upala (highway 6) - (last visited: 2010) the only paved road cutting through the cordilleran valley in the north between the mountains running through Bijagua into the Alajuela Province. Eventually, you will see turnoffs to place in the "far north mountain haitats" listed above.

Palo Verde National Park is the most widely visited park in Guanacaste. Palo Verde is the best place in Costa Rica to see Jabiru. Although this is generally no problem in the dry season, I'm not sure it should be expected in the summer wet season (birds disperse all over Guanacaste and into Puntarenas at that season).  If you choose to check Palo Verde in summer, don't spend all your time looking for Jabiru in the lagoons and marshes where I suspect they are more regularly seen in winter. Check the bigger trees periodically. I've seen a single Jabiru high in a tree on our only summer visit to Palo Verde. A winter visit many years earlier, on the other hand, produced 6-7 birds. I considered my summer sighting of Jabiru at Palo Verde a lucky sighting. Palo Verde has both good dry woodland trails and a large lagoon. Because of the lagoon, mosquitoes can be a problem here. Bring your repellent.

There are lots of good birds at Palo Verde. Besides Jabiru, Palo Verde is one of the best places for Limpkin, Crested Bobwhite, Snail Kite, and much of Costa Rica's waterfowl populations in winter. Along with Carara National Park, I consider it one of the better birding locations in western Costa Rica.

Lomas Barbudal Biological Reserve is a refuge has similar habitat to that at Palo Verde but without the lagoon and marshy habitat. It is almost geographically adjacent Palo Verde. However, there's a very nice trail near the headquarters that hugs a creek and has some large trees and a running stream - making it a bit different than the marshy areas of Palo Verde. It's best to have a SUV-type vehicle to get there (as well as Palo Verde if you do that refuge). At Lomas Barbudal, we saw Double-striped Thick-knee in the pastures, Lesser Greenlet, and Olivaceous Woodcreeper which we did not see at Palo Verde or Santa Rosa. Most birds at Lomas Barbudal, however, are birds you might see at Santa Rosa or Palo Verde - which are larger parks.

Black and White Owl (left) - Bruce Hallett

Tropical Lowland Birding

Carara National Park  The real change in birdlife while driving south from Guanacaste into the state of Puntarenas is Carara National Park on the west-central coast. This is an easy place to bird, an easy place to drive to, an easy place to get a guide (they wait for tourists at the gate of the River Trail or sometimes at the visitor's center and offer their services - worth it on your first trip), it's almost always productive, and anywhere around Carara is good viewing for Scarlet Macaw. In other words, this should be a primary birding stop for everyone. I've seen a lot of birds at Carara and I see new birds every time I go there. Carara NP is about 2-4 hours from most places in Guanacaste and about 2 hours from San Jose. Staying overnight is quite nice at Villa Lapas or the Cerro Lodge both of which are very close to Carara NP.

We were able to see several Boat-billed Herons at Carara NP on the River Trail near the lagoon on two occasions during two separate July visits. In summer, the Carara River Trail may be the most reliable location for this species in Costa Rica.

Manuel Antonio NP and Hacienda Baru Refuge - Manuel Antonio NP (4 hours south from Liberia, 2.5 hours southwest from San Jose) and Hacienda Baru refuge (near Dominical about 20 minutes south of Manuel Antonio) are just south of Carara NP. I have visited both spots, Manuel Antonio several times since it serves the purpose of giving us real vacation time after some intense birding.

Manuel Antonio NP (MANP) does not have a lot of great birding habitat, but it does have one fairly nice trail in the park. It's a pretty crowded park entrance although the trail itself is not so crowded. Just before the park entrance is a bohemian marketplace of sorts, so you must get to the trailhead early. MANP is growing with lodges and people. It's a beautiful place so you can see why people build there. In a natural history sense, I recommend it only as a nice place to stay, a very good place to see monkeys, and a hike along the one walking trail in the park. It's also pretty good for Fiery-billed Aracari around some of the better hotels. On the trail, we had Golden-naped Woodpecker, Brown-hooded Parrot, and Black-bellied Wren among the usual suspects. If you are a serious birdwatcher, you might avoid this park and move on to other areas. But if you want to enjoy Costa Rican beauty, it's hard to find a prettier coastal experience. There are very nice accommodations here although you frequently don't see them from the main road.

Children's Eternal Rainforest (right) - Bruce Hallett 

Hacienda Baru is a private refuge with accommodations about 20 minutes south from MANP near Dominical. You can search for their web site where they have a bird checklist. Hacienda Baru has several trails and we had nice looks at Charming Hummingbird, Yellow-headed Caracara, King Vulture (flying over) and American Pygmy Kingfisher. I saw a Blue Ground Dove on the road as we drove over. Unlike Manuel Antonio, it's a good place for forest birds.

Hacienda Baru has several options for birders and offers a couple of different hikes just to watch birds (we didn't do either of these guided tours). The road from Manuel Antonio to Hacienda Baru is now paved as of 2010, and maps may show it incorrectly as a dirt road. If you were serious about birding, and your beach-loving wife owed you a favor from when you grabbed that 10-inch lizard out of the bathtub in your Liberia hotel room, then I would suggest Hacienda Baru over Manuel Antonio National Park for the birding.

South of Dominical is the town of Uvita. Uvita has several places to stay and it's a reasonable networking spot for south-central Costa Rica. From here one has access to the Osa Peninsula and birding lodges like Esquinas Lodge and Bosque de la Tigre Lodge. The locally owned refuge of Oro Verde is 5 minutes from Uvita. The mountain habitats of Talari Lodge, Skutch's farm (Los Cusingos Neotropical Bird Sanctuary), and Quebrada Biological Reserve are about 2 hours away and Hacienda Baru is less than a half an hour from Uvita.

Esquinas Lodge is easier to get to if one is driving, but there are no lodge guides for birders. Bosque del Rio Tigre lodge is another hour on the road and the accommodations follow a more ecolodge tradition, but the guide\owners and the property itself are particularly birder-friendly. The Bosque del Rio Tigre experience may also give birders the possibility of Turquoise and Yellow-billed Cotinga sightings within walking distance of the lodge. I have seen Little Tinamou and Black-faced Anthrush by merely looking over the lodge balcony on the second floor. Black-cheeked Ant-Tanager sometimes come to the fruit feeders, and Marbled Wood-Quail call from most of the trails. A non-birder would almost certainly prefer the accommodations at Esquinas, but the guided services at Bosque generally make it the preferred choice of hard-core birders and bio-bums.

Cano Negro Refuge is a lowland habitat east of Upala (and in the Alajuela Province) if the far north-central Costa Rica. It can have some Caribbean lowland birds but an overnight is required there since the 2-hour morning boat trip around the lagoon is needed to see Nicaraguan Grackle, Green Ibis, Black-collared Hawk and a few others that might be target species. We also had a nice look at two Bat Falcons, several Bare-throated Tiger Herons, Gray-necked Wood Rail, and a surprising Snowy Cotinga perched in a tree on the lagoon. There are two lodges available in town... both are quite clean as I've looked at both. The Cano Negro Natural Lodge has the only true restaurant.

This is not a well-visited refuge, but I found the little town around the lagoon clean and inviting. There are no trails, so you'll need to bird the small dirt roads if you feel like birding before or after your boat trip. While birding on the roads around the lodge before the boat trip, we had Crimson-

fronted Parakeets, Mealy Parrots, Collared Aracari, Gray-fronted Dove, and Montezuma Oropendula as well as the usual suspects. Paraques were common on the roads after the sun went down - and are strangely quiet at that time of year. This refuge is geographically closer to Liberia than San Jose.

To date, I have seen no other location in Costa Rica for observing Nicaraguan Grackle except on the Cano Negro boat trip, but other trip reports suggest observations of the bird on the road to Los Chilies in the dry season (which is generally the same area as Cano Negro but just a few kilometers further east).

The Nicaraguan Grackle is simply a smaller Great-tailed Grackle in every respect. Our boat guide knew the difference, but we picked the bird out before our guide did so the bird is identifiable to birders assuming you've seen enough Great-taileds to use as a barometer. We saw perhaps 8-10 birds, most in tall reeds out in the lagoon.

The boat trip at Cano Negro was $25 a person in 2006, but was easily worth it. There are several places to get the boat tour - at either lodge or the public boat ramp - and I think a guide would do it any time of day on the spur of the moment if necessary. We took the boat trip out of the Hotel de Campo using a guide named Jimmy. He knew no English, but he knew his birds.

For other comments on specific birding identification challenges in Costa Rica, click here.

La Selva - For some of the best birding, the classic places for Caribbean birds of Costa Rica (the richest bird life in CR) are found at La Selva OTS Biological Station (lowland habitat - 5 hours from Guanacaste and 2 hours from San Jose).

Three-toed Sloth - Jim Peterson

The La Selva OTS is certainly worth it if you're making a trip to the central valley around San Jose. You can get there a couple of different ways without getting on unpaved roads, so even a small car can make the trip. The sheer volume of birdlife around the dining hall is staggering. La Selva offers an early morning guided bird tour at 5:45 AM for a fee, but advanced confirmation is required. I strongly recommend the early morning bird walk. Otherwise operating hours begin at 8:00 and a second round of natural history tours begin (also for a fee). Lunch can be purchased in advance from their web site. Food is family style at the research dining hall. The OTS designation means that it's a tropical research station (as is Palo Verde) and ongoing research projects have to be protected from visitors. I recommend the La Selva users guide for a good understanding of the facilities.

We stayed at the Selva Verde Lodge - only a few minutes from La Selva OTS - but there are several places around the vicinity (including the La Selva OTS itself if you don't mind camp bunking). If staying at Selva Verde Lodge, I personally would choose the lodge accommodations over the optional bungalows. We enjoyed the bungalows, but there's no great advantage to staying in them that I could see.

Selva Verde Lodge has their own guides that can be hired to bird around the lodge property. It's a good place to see endangered Great Green Macaws flying over or a Sunbittern along the river. Instead of Selva Verde Lodge, many birding tour groups stay at the less expensive LaQuinta Sarapiqui also near La Selva and seem to be very happy there. Birdwatching around the grounds there seems equally as good.

Several less expensive options, like El Gavilan and Tirimbina Lodge can be found in close proximity to La Selva. Both places are conveniently located a few kilometers from La Selva. Tirimbina is on the newly developed Costa Rica Birding Trail. A little bit more about Tirimbina and El Gavilan can be found on their web site.

Other locations for lowland birding not commonly on birding itineraries but still known for good birding:

Laguna Del Legarto Lodge (northeast), and Selva Bananito Lodge (southeast).

Other great places like Tapanti, Cerro de la Muerte the Savegre Mtn Lodge (on the south slope of Cerro de la Muerte), have relatively easy access in terms of distance from San Jose, but you are forced to drive through San Jose proper if you are coming from the metropolitan area or the international airport. Corcovado, (Osa Peninsula) and Tortugero, are fairly long distances from any international airport. They have specific travel problems to try in a short amount of time from Liberia, but are possible from San Jose.

Although I have done both Cerro de la Muerte and Tapanti in summer, it was done using San Jose as a home base. On one occasion I was on tour with an ABA birding group, and on the other occasion I had a natural history guide service take me and a friend on a day trip to the top of Cerro de la Muerte. You can make that call from almost any hotel in San Jose. There are several natural history companies that have flyers in most hotel lobbies.

Even with San Jose as your Airport, places like Tortugero, the Osa Peninsula, and areas south of the peninsula like La Amistad National Park, have special problems even outside of the distance when trying to access those places by car. Tortugero is mostly accessed by boat once inside the park, and the Osa Peninsula is just a lengthy stretch from San Jose no matter how you cut it. Both places are strenuous drives to the outer reaches of the Costa Rican infrastructure. The Osa Peninsula is a quicker access by small plane although they've added some paved road recently that makes it a bit more comfortable up to the town of Puerto Jimenez. La Amistad National Park (near the Panama border) is also a difficult drive and has no paved roads within the park.