Birding at the Alpahuayu-Mishana Reserve, UNAP Section (-Jess)

Normally, given the squares that we are, we don’t ever have to factor things like “clubbing” into our sleep equation, especially on nights when we are going to get up at 4am to go birding. However, after several days of having to wrack our brains for things to fill our time with (while waiting for the people I am working with to get back from Argentina), we didn’t want to turn down the opportunity to hang out with other people besides each other and do real-life activities, so we were suckered in to staying out past midnight and then getting up at 4. Add to this the fact that it is hot as bejeezuz, that we were both pretty sore from our gym adventures the day before, and that we didn’t want to look like pansies and stop all the time for rest and food and water, and you’ll have a good sense of the mind-frame we were in at the times when the birding was slow.

We realized that our previous birding experiences haven’t really prepared us for birding in the rainforest- mostly because you generally never see the bird and there are about ten zillion possible species. We were very glad we’d decided to go with a guide, Dennis, who impressed us with his knowledge of calls and shared lots of good natural history information with us. For example, on the same 1km stretch of path, we went through 3 different kinds of forest that have their own characteristic plants and animals and it all depends on soil geography (Dave- cool huh?). Two of the kinds of forest (white sand forests, or “varillals") are relatively rare in the Amazon basin and have several endemic birds associated with them (several of which are new species discovered by one of the guys I will hopefully be working with). There are some video clips from the forest on the you-tube site to give you an idea of what it is like adentro de la selva.

So, since I have a habit of rambling on, here is a condensed version of the highlights of our seen & heard birds this morning, chronologically:
1. Little Blue-black Grassquits that kept hopping very comically a few vertical feet and landing in the same spot.
2. We heard and then saw a chachalaca and learned that if you cross-breed it with a rooster it becomes super aggressive and is good for cockfighting.
3. I spotted a male and female Swallow Tanager (google these, they are beautiful), which the guide said he’d never seen at this location before, and that he’d never seen a pair together, and that they were indicators that the forest was healing (we were in a secondary scrubby field at that point, on the edge of the reserve.
4. Also google yellow-rumped caciques, they are pretty common, but cool-looking, with hanging nest-sacs.
5. We passed under a Screaming Piha lek (place where the males all gather to show off for the ladies) and got a video (on you-tube site) of their loud screaming.
6. Then we walked through a lek for hummingbirds called Great-billed Hermits (google them), and got buzzed as they chirped and chased each other around.
7. Our guide entertained us with stories of things that could go wrong in the jungle, like his friend the researcher who got bitten by an ant and had a fever for four days and had to be evacuated, or his friend the researcher who got speared in the leg by a trap that hunters had set to catch armadillos and had to be flown to Lima (“you said you were planning to do research here?”)
8. On our way back, we walked right into a big group of little squirrel-like tamarin monkeys (this species has the female as boss, and the males care for the young’ns). It is almost possible to forget that the trail you are walking is in the Amazon, until you walk under a group of monkeys. Then you think- whoa. Google these too- they’re cute and look kind of like cats.
9. We also saw a tiny red-backed poison frog that our guide said is used for medicine during heart operations, and is fairly lucrative for the people to collect so they are studying its life-cycle to make a management plan. (Cool fact: males of this species have been found hopping vertically up trees carrying a couple tadpoles on their backs.)
10. Last, and best, when we were out of the jungle and walking back across the scrubby fields to the road, Andrew spotted a fat little owl sitting in a bare-branched tree. Turns out, this was a species the guide had never seen before in his life (Rufous-banded Owl), and he was really excited and told Andrew that he had a “muy buen ojo”. We got close enough to get a great look with our binoculars, and a bad picture with my camera (see photo site). [Correction: after talking with a few hardcore ornithologists, we have learned that this was most definitely NOT a Rufous-banded Owl, but was infact a Feruginous Pygmy Owl (still cool). Apologies for the confusion.]

Overall, despite sleepiness, sweaty sweaty heat, hunger, thirst, slight discouragement at our extensive ignorance, and Andrew having to deal with only Spanish the whole time, a good time was had by all and we are looking forward to future chances to get out of the city and into the green stuff.