Molly and I descended from the rain forest yesterday to the “dry forest” of Guanacaste’s Pacific Coast, Las Catalinas. This is our third visit to visit to this “Mediterranean Hillside Beach Town” which my brother helped develop starting 20 years ago. Two cool features other than just the natural beauty are:

• Cars are not allowed
• Forest next to the town has been set apart as a preserve

Thus, by 6:15 this morning I had driven up and over an extremely steep hill via a dirt road to Zapotal. Once again I was in birding heaven. For the first 90 minutes I saw nary another human, but the birds were most definitely present. While setting up a birdsong listening device and trail cam in a remote dry creek bed (will be full in the rainy season), I was treated to a “Common Black Hawk” (not common at all) chasing a large bird as prey for breakfast. My camera was back at the car because I had my hands full with the equipment I was placing in the forest.

The star of the morning was this Pale-Billed Woodpecker. A few years ago I learned what habitat this bird prefers, and it was within 200 yards of where I found a pair two years ago. This bird species was actually my first find of the morning when I started my serious birding … it has a loud double thunk (not three or four) for drumming which I heard the moment I stopped the car and started my hike.

I will eventually finish processing all my “rain forest birds”, but the number of images is rather overwhelming right now. In closing … my private birding beach around 7 am this morning! (video link for email subscribers). My trailcam and birdsong listening device (OwlSense) is back in the forest via the dry creek bed about 1/2 mile from where I took this video. The dirt road becomes impassable at the dry creek road crossing to continue by car.