Hot on the heels of yesterday’s superb skimmer, a Golden-chevroned Tanager put in an appearance at our feeder today. Sadly it didn’t stay long enough to get a shot, but number 82 is reached. Photograph copyright Aditi J. Chaves.
Golden-chevroned Tanager.
Returning home after a long day in the field with Ola Sandberg, a friend from Sweden, I received a phone call from Elis telling me to immediately go back out again as there was a Black Skimmer on the local beach. We rushed off, Ola got some good shots of it flying along the surf and skimming in the approved fashion. The bird then flew out into the bay. It suddenly dawned on me that I could probably see it from the apartment, so a second twitch ensued, back home. Arriving home Elis already had the telescope set up and after a couple of anxious minutes we found it out over the bay; apartment list moves to 81.
Black Skimmer.
After the Minas Triangle section was completed, an extension in the Serra da Mantequeira was just the ticket escaping the heat of Minas, it was raining to start with but soon cleared. One species that it is always good to see up there is the Black-capped Piprites.
Black-backed Piprites.
Another highland specialty is the Black-breasted Plovercrest. This one is a rather wet female that we saw at the feeders of the Pousada Três Pinheiros.
Female Black-breasted Plovercrest.
One of the commonest and most attractive birds of the region is the Red-rumped Warbling-Finch.
Red-rumped Warbling-Finch.
See Tommy’s complete collection of this leg of the trip on http://homepage.mac.com/sandman777/Brazil-October2009-4/
See also Knut’s pictures on Flickr which include some photos taken here in Ubatuba where he stayed with me as an extension after Tommy had return home… http://www.flickr.com/photos/22333182@N04/sets/72157622641949217/
All photos on this page copyright Tommy Pedersen.
On the last leg of the triangle proper we moved on to Serra do Cipó. Naturally the Cipó Canastero was the target, and it fell, along with the two lovely hummers – Hyacinth Visorbearer and Horned Sungem – on the first evening.
Cipó Canastero.
Hyacinth Visorbearer.
Horned Sungem.
A real bonus, at least for Tommy, was this Jaguarundi. Actually the biggest bonus for Tommy, or so he felt at the time, was that it didn’t eat him! It appeared at the same time that Tommy found the canasteros, and disappeared when he shouted to let us know. It certainly looks rather fierce in this shot.
Jaguarundi.
See Tommy’s complete collection of photos at Serra do Cipó on http://homepage.mac.com/sandman777/Brazil-October2009-3/
Canastero and Jaguarundi photos copyright Tommy Pedersen. Visorbearer and Sungem photos copyright Knut Hansen,
We then moved on to Caraça, here we were joined by Elis. (It was our wedding anniversary… ahhhhh!) Here of course the Maned Wolves were the main attraction.
Maned Wolf on the monastery steps.
A couple of the boy’s target species gave themselves up here; like this Magpie Tanager which Elis found.
Magpie Tanager.
Swallow-tailed Cotinga was a must-see bird but it took us until the last morning to get views like this.
Swallow-tailed Cotinga.
See Tommy’s complete collection of photos at Caraça on http://homepage.mac.com/sandman777/Brazil-October2009-2/
All photos on this page copyright Tommy Pedersen.
I recently had the privilege to travel to the ‘Minas Triangle’ (Serra da Canastra, Serra do Cipó and Santuário do Caraça), with my old friend Tommy and his best buddy Knut.
Red-legged Seriema.
We drove up to Canastra from São Paulo. One of their target birds was the Red-legged Seriema. We stopped at a service station along the way to fill up with fuel and calorie packed food items and were told by a curious forecourt attendant, who wondered who the devil we were, that there was a resident Seriema in the fields behind the station. We looked in vain and were just about to leave when it appeared the other side of the fence resulting in the photo shown here.
Two adult and three young Brazilian Mergansers.
We stopped at Canastra for three full days; the first day we were lucky enough to find the main target for the area in the lower section of the region, the Brazilian Merganser. As can be seen in this photo there was a family party of six, two adults and four immatures.
Black-masked Finch.
The second day was spent on the upper park area resulting in many good birds such as this Black-masked Finch.
Brasilia Tapaculo.
The biggest coup of the day however was getting superb views and this photo of the ’skulking’ Brasilia Tapaculo.
The last day was spent photographing anything that would sit still, or, as in the case of this magnificent King Vulture, fly close enough.
Cock-tailed Tyrant.
All photos on this page copyright Tommy Pedersen.
See Tommy’s complete set of photos of our time at Serra da Canastra on http://homepage.mac.com/sandman777/Brazil-October2009-1/
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