Travel to Costa Rica and Experience a Bird Watcher’s Paradise

Travel to Costa Rica and Experience a Bird Watcher’s Paradise

The Costa Rica Star – Residents of Costa Rica know that the dry season brings a scarcity of rain and an abundance of birdsong. This is when the lovely yiguirro (Turdus grayii or clay-colored American robin) mates and breeds, which means that males will melodically sing from before sunrise until after sundown. The yiguirro is just one of dozens of songbirds that make Costa Rica their permanent or migratory habitat, which makes this country very symphonic in terms of birdsong.

In Costa Rica, the adorable yiguirro is a national symbol and thus is fiercely protected. The yiguirro’s song is part of folklore since farmers used to believe it would attract rain for their crops. These birds tend to nest very close to farms and human settlements, which means that people can enjoy their song during the driest and warmest days of the year. Yiguirros nesting on the roof of a house is a sign of good luck, although residents must be prepared for months of loud and repetitive birdsong that starts at about 4:00 a.m. and lasts all day for a few months.

Costa Rica is a Bird Watcher’s Paradise, Especially for Those who Enjoy Spotting Songbirds

Darnis, the extensive database of species in Costa Rica maintained by the National Institute on Biodiversity (Spanish acronym: INBio) is the best place to learn about the numerous songbirds of Costa Rica. From the Darnis list of species home page,inputting the query “ave de canto” will return all the species considered to be mellifluent. You will see that Costa Rica is definitely blessed with a generous portion of the avian world when it comes to songbirds. Here are just three of the species you will find therein:

Tangara larvata – siete colores or Golden-hooded Tanager
Euphonia anneae – aguio or Tawny-capped Euphonia
Icterus pectoralis – cholpia (mostly in Guanacaste) or Spot-breasted Oriole

The melodies of many of the songbirds of Costa Rica have been patiently recorded by Gerardo Obando Calderon, whose Birdsong in my Caribbean Town CD is part of the natural science curriculum at schools near the magnificent Braulio Carrillo National Park.

The Birdsong in the My Caribbean Town CD is only a portion of Mr. Obando’s opus: The Bio-Acoustic Collection of Avian Costa Rica, which has been recognized by the Rainforest Alliance as an innovative eco-friendly initiative.

The collection, which is currently 37 hours long, has 492 sounds of 138 species. Not all the recordings, however, are as pleasant as the yiguirro birdsong. Many in the Psittacidae (parakeet and parrot) family can be noisy and annoying to the human ear, which is something that people in Costa Rica must consider when planting fruit trees near their homes.