Birding from Rio de Janeiro

Amazingly we have reached the end of our wonderful 8 month adventure travelling from Mexico to Rio via 17 countries. We have had some fantastic wildlife adventures along the way and I have really enjoyed sharing them on this blog. But all good things must come to an end so it came down to our last day birding on this trip when we were in Rio de Janeiro.

We had reached out to Daniel a birding guide who runs a birding company called Irmãos Mello with his twin brother Gabriel. To say Daniel and Gabriel have written the book on birding in the Rio de Janeiro state is actually not an exaggeration – they actually wrote the best bird guide for the area and are currently working on the second edition. So I had high hopes of our day together – we were not disappointed as both brothers were excellent company and fantastic birding guides.

I really wanted to finish our birding adventure with a big day and over WhatsApp Daniel had been very supportive of this idea. So he actually arranged for Gabriel to pick us up early at 5.30am and do a bit of birding with us on the way to the Serra dos Órgãos National Park where Daniel would take over and we would bird until the sunset that evening.

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Whilst we saw 15 species from the drive from Rio only Orange-Winged Parakeet was a new bird for us. It was still early we started birding at Daniel’s house where he has set up some feeders. The light was good for photos and a mixture of birds we have seen before with new species mixed in.

The Blue-Naped Chlorophonia had a lovely electric blue eye-ring. The Violaceous Euphonia was a lifer, as was the Azure-Shouldered Tanager. We saw both male and female Ruby-Crowned Tanagers but only a photo of the female.

It wasn’t all a riot of colour. The Shiny Cowbird and Sooty Grassquit (lifer) also put in an appearance. And whilst the Ruddy Ground Dove and White-Eyed Parakeets were far from new they did allow some good close views and nice photos. The Sombre Hummingbird was a new bird which came often to the nectar feeders.

A splash of sunshine was provided by the Orange-Bellied Euphonias and Saffron Finches. But I really enjoyed seeing and photographing Green-Headed Tanagers for the first time which offered lovely graduated tones of every shade of green.

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After a while of enjoying the feeder setup at Daniel’s house we headed out towards the nearby woods. Whilst walking there we saw some Grey-Rumped Swifts and White-Thighed Swallows flying over hawking insects. Once in the woods we quickly added Chestnut-Bellied Euphonia, Chestnut-Crowed Becard and Black-Cheeked Gnateater to our growing list of new birds.

Various Tanagers offered more distant views including Yellow-Backed, Red-Necked (photographed), Golden-Chevroned and Flame-Crested. A Euler’s Flycatcher sang and offered good photos through a small window into the bush where it was perched. A Plain-Winged Woodcreeper flew in and worked it’s way up a couple of nearby trees

At this point we were birding with both Daniel and Gabriel and Garbiel called us back for an excellent sighting. The rare endemic White-Necked Hawk could be seen below in a distant tree. This bird has a tiny range in the Atlantic Forest of Brazil.

Manakins were about with both a male White-Bearded and female Swallow-Tailed showing well.

Other birds we saw in the woods but didn’t photograph included Black Jacobin, Plain Antvireo, Scaled Antbird, Streak-Capped Antwren, White-Throated Woodcreeper, Southern Antpipit, Cliff Flycatcher and Grey-Hooded Attila. After a productive hour in these woods we headed back to the car seeing Plain Parakeet and hearing distant Blue-Winged Macaw on the way.

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At this point we said goodbye to Gabriel thanking him for a fantastic couple of hours in which we had already seen 70 species of birds. Daniel now drove us to the Serra dos Órgãos National Park where we hoped to see a different mix of birds. Our first site was at a lower elevation.

Out first new bird here was surprisingly a hummingbird – a Saw-Billed Hermit. I am used to Hermits having long curved bills but this was fairly short and straight by comparison. It flew around and landed briefly on a perch allowing a quick photo. A Spotted Antvireo allowed some sky-backlit shots before it came a bit lower with the green vegetation allowing a much more pleasing backdrop. A Yellow-Legged Thrush was a new bird but didn’t come out from behind the vegetation it was hiding behind but I had slightly better luck with a distant Yellow-Eared Woodpecker.

We walked a couple of trails in this park. We had already heard a Grey-Headed Tody-Flycatcher and I was hoping to see it as it was a new bird. Fortunately it did eventually give itself up here and I captured brief shot. Another new bird for me was the Yellow-Green Grosbeak along with the Streak-Capped Antwren

We saw various other birds at this location too including Maroon Bellied Parakeet, Star-Throated, White-Flanked and Unicoloured Antwrens, Rufous-Bellied Leaftosser, Lesser Woodcreeper, Black-Capped Foliage-Gleener, Olive-Green Tanager and Red-Crowned Ant-Tanager. We walked to a nearby stream and quickly saw a pair of Buff-Bellied Puffbirds.

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We stopped for lunch and then drove to a higher elevation location where again we hoped to see a different mix of birds. Arriving at the new location we were delighted to see a couple of Tanager Species – the amazing Brassy-Breasted Tanager with it’s electric blue eyes and the more restrained Black-Goggled Tanager.

This was quickly followed by a new endemic hummingbird the Brazilian Ruby which fed on some nearby flowers and occasionally perched.

We were watching a bird we had seen before, the Olivaceous Woodcreeper, when Daniel called our attention to look skywards for a raptor and indeed we had good views of the Black Hawk-Eagle (a species we had last seen only briefly in Panama). Once we had finished watching the Hawk-Eagle Daniel tracked down some other species including Yellow-Olive Flatbill and Pallid Spinetail.

A couple of birds fairly nondescript in and of themselves made up for their drab plumages by offering sustained and close views. First a White-Throated Spadebill followed by a White-Browed Foliage-Gleaner. I took time to enjoy the photographic opportunities.

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We continued to work our way up to higher elevations in the car and at one point a Slaty-Breasted Woodrail ran out and ran alongside the car. We stopped to look over the stream and a Sharp-Tailed Streamcreeper offered great views behaving very much like a Dipper back home. Here we were on the last birding day of our trip seeing not only a new bird but also a new family as I had never seen a Streamcreeper before (albeit this is the only Streamcreeper that there is and it is closely related to Ovenbirds).

It was getting later on in the day and the sun was getting lower in the sky. I felt we now had about seen about a hundred bird species in the day but was hoping to see a few more. We arrived at the highpoint of our day and took an elevated boardwalk which enabled us to see higher in the forest canopy.

During this walk it appeared that birds came in twos. First of all we saw two Manakin species close together. First the Swallow-Tailed Manakin which we has seen earlier in the day but this time the male gave us a good close view. Second was the stunning Pin-Tailed Manakin which was a truly lovely bird.

We walked further along the board walk and could hear a loud noise. At first thought I would have said this was a mammal but Daniel was confident this was in fact a Dusky-Legged Guan. Frustratingly we could not see this bird despite it being substantial in size. But then Daniel found a window through to it and we were able to enjoy this lifer. And then a smaller but perhaps more impressive bird the monstrous-billed Black-Billed Scythebill. We had last seen a member of this family in Costa Rica

Taking a break from the birds at this point a solitary Capuchin Monkey traversed the trees above us. We also heard but didn’t see the mega rare and endangered Brown-Backed Parakeet at this point too. We also stumbled across two Brown Tinamou which we saw well but didn’t have time to photograph before they scurried off out of view.

Just as we thought it was time to move on a mixed flock of Toucanets arrived in the trees above us. Most were Spot-Billed but a few Saffron Toucanets were among them too.

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Daniel was keen to show us one more location before the sun finally set so we headed to a nearby area of farm land. Upon arriving we quickly saw two new birds first a Southern Yellowthroat quickly followed by a Glittering-Throated Emerald.

A Ferruginous Pygmy Owl flew into a nearby tree allowing close views. I went for a call of nature only to get called back to see two Whistling Herons fly over and land in a distant field. This was a new bird for me as I hadn’t seen it earlier in Iguazu.

However the principle target for this location was the endemic wine-red Brazilian Tanager and Daniel knew his patch well and quickly found about 10 distant birds. Some of them kindly flew across the reed-bed and joined us in a nearby bush to allow closer views. A great way to end a fantastic day!

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When we got home and added up the lists I was delighted to see we had seen 123 species of bird and heard a further 5 species in this single day. This was the most I had observed in any day on the trip (and probably in my life for that matter!). Of these 65 were lifers! What a great day. Big thanks to Daniel and Grabriel of Irmãos Mello for such great feathered memories.

We ended up leaving our short stop in Brazil with 137 species of which 66 were lifers and 43 were photo lifers. Our final total for the big trip was 1,425 species with 658 in North America and 965 in South America.