AWP's Third Neotropical Expedition

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In the last two weeks I visited Panama. In this thread I will give an overview of the captive animals in the institutions I visited, as well as the most notable spotted animals in the wild.

To start with, the most seen animal was definately the great-tailed grackle. This bird shows up almost everywhere and often in small to large groups. Other common Panamanian wildlife consists of black vulture and in lesser extent turkey vulture, great egret, and in coastal areas brown pelican and American frigate bird.

 

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Punta Culebra
On my second day in Panama I visited the Punta Culebra Nature Center, part of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. It is located at an peninsula of Isla Naos, a former Island that is now part of the Amador Causeway. The western site of the peninsula consists of sandy beach, rocky shores and some mangrove vegatation. Facing this coastal area are a couple of buildings: a ranarium, an smalll aquarium building, a basin for two rescued hawksbill turtles (Eretmochelys imbricata) and touching pools for echinoderms. The eastern part of the peninsula is covered with a remnant of tropical dry forest. Most notable wildlife seen here are Hoffmann's two-toed sloths, crab-eating raccoon, crimson-backed tanager, red-crowned woodpecker and green iguanas. The staff is very helpfull and provide lot of information about both captive and wild animals in the Center.

Species list ranarium
* Pirri harlequin frog (Atelopus glyphus)
* Cerro Sapo harlequin frog (Atelopus certus)
* Limosa harlequin frog (Atelopus limosus)
* Strawberry poison frog (Oophaga pumilio)
* Green-and-black poison frog (Dendrobates auratus)
* Lowland rocket frog (Silverstonei flotator)
* Granular glass frog (Cochranella granulosa)
* Common rain frog (Craugastor fitzingeri)
* Tungara frog (Engystomops pustulosus)
* Red-eyed treefrog (Agalychnis callidryas)
* Leaflitter toad (Rhinella alata) [off-display due to maintenance on the exhibit]

Species list touching pools
* Caribbean: red cushion star (Oreaster reticulatus), variegated sea urchin (Lytechinus variegatus), sea cucumber (Holothuria mexicana)
* Pacific: Panamic cushion star (Pentaceraster cumingi ), slate pencil urchin (Eucidaris thoursii), sea cucumber (Isostichopus fuscus)

Species list aquarium
* Bluehead wrasse (Thalassoma bifasciatum)
* French grunt (Haemulon flavilineatum)
* Red lionfish (Pterois volitans)
Several others are kept, but were unsigned.

 

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Parque Nacional Soberanía
I had a morning walk of about two hours along the Camino de Oleoducto (Pipeline Road), famous as the best birding location of Central America. It turned out to be quite disappointing, as the guide was a guy who had hardly any knowledge on wildlife (he guided all our tours in the Canal region). Nonetheless, with a brown-throated sloth, white-nosed coati, variegated squirrel, mantled howler, Swainson's toucan, white-tailed trogon, female black-crowned antshrike and a couple of tanagers (spotted without much influence of the guide), it was worth the trip.

Biomuseo
In the afternoon I went to the Biomuseo, located at the beginning of the Amador Causeway. The building itself with its multicolored Gehry architecture is more spectacular than the exhibitions. The northern building was closed for renovation, including the exhibition on the Great American Biotic Interchange I was looking forward to see with parade-like presentation of models of glyptodon, ground sloth, horse and sabretooth cat among others (I got to see a glimpse of it through a window). The exhibitions on bird migration, paleo-indians, the food web of the rainforest en recently opened aquarium (the two main bassins were still fishless) were nice, but not that special. I liked the large garden however with hummingbirds, multiple species of passerines (fork-tailed flycatcher being the highlight) and the views on the entrance of the Canal.

Species list aquarium
Several species are kept, but none were signed.

 

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Parque Nacional Chagres
The trip to PN Chagres was to visit an indigenous community, but I spotted quite a number of birds along the riverbanks while travelling to and from the village: several species of heron/egret, banded stilt, southern lapwing, jacana, ringed kingfisher, carancho and osprey.

Radisson Summit Hotel
Located on a forested hill surrounded by golf courses at the edge of PN Soberanía, this hotel turned out to be a great location for spotting wildlife. Next to the lobby was a feeding platform, visited by a lone white-nosed coati and five collared araçaris. Around dusk and dawn agoutis were quite easy to spot in the forest. Several bird species were around, including blue-crowned motmot and large numbers of southern lapwings, next to common garden birds like palm and blue-grey tanager, clay-colored thrush and flycatchers. Caimans lived in the pools between the golf courses. Lesser capybaras are also around, but only show up at night according to the staff. Tamarins were featered in the leaflet of the hotel, but didn't show. The miss of these two species was however compensated by a northern tamandua that showed up on a morning walk!

 

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Isla Iguana
After a trip to the Caribbean side of the Canal (where I saw white-faced capuchins and yellow-headed caracara among others), I left the canal region for the Azuero Peninsula. My stay at this peninsula included a trip by boat to Isla Iguana, an island reserve in the Pacific Ocean with black iguanas, yellow warblers, lots of frigate birds and a good snorkeling spot with guineafowl puffer and azure parrot fish as the most notable species.

Boquete
In the cloud forests around Boquete I would see the number one on my wish list for Panamanian birds, one I never really expected to see. At first, my sightings in and around Boquete weren't that spectacular (but nice anyhow) with a group of coatis and several garden passerines with rufous-collared sparrow and Cherrie's tanager being additions to my species list for Panama. During a walk in the cloud forest along a serie of hanging bridges, one of my travel group saw a green bird in the bushes and asked me what it was: a quetzal!

 

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Bocas del Toro
On the islands of Bocas del Toro, I went on two excursions by boat. The first one was a trip to three locations of Parque Nacional Marino Isla Bastimentos. Through a creek surrounded by mangrove forest the boat went to Quebrada Sal, an indigenous community for a walk in the surrounding rainforest. The main goal was to spot strawberry poison frogs, which we saw at the end of the trail. The highlight however was a three-toed sloth with young, descending a tree to defaecate/urinate. Other wildlife at Quebrada Sal included a spectacled caiman, Montezuma oropendolas and a female red-throated ant-tanager. Next location was Cayo Coral, a beautiful snorkeling spot with butterflyfish, parrotfish and sergeant-major among others. Last location was Red Frog Beach, but despite the name no strawberry poison frogs spotted there.

The second boat trip went to three locations on and around Isla Colón. First stop was Isla Pájaros or Swan's Cay, a rocky Island covered with trees that serves as a nesting location for brown booby and red-billed tropicbird. Next was a part on the Soropta Canal, once used for the transportation of bananas. Now it is a good location to see wildlife, with several species of egret/heron, belted Kingfisher, Passerini's tanager, cuckoos, greater kiskadee and green iguana spotted. The tour ended with Playa Estrella, with many cushion stars (I stopped counting after 50) in sea close to this beach.

 

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Parque Natural Metropolitano & Parque Municipal Summit
I spended my last day in Panama in the parks near the capital. I did two walking trails in the Parque Natural Metropolitano, a rainforest at the edge of the city. Next to several small and dull colored passerines, I spotted an agouti, white-necked puffbird and black-crowned tityra in the park.

From Metropolitano I took a taxi to Parque Municipal Summit, a half a hour drive. The park is located close to Parque Nacional Soberanía and it is the unofficial zoo of Ciudad de Panamá (in fact it is a "refugio" for rescued and orphaned wildlife in a botanical garden, but it looks like a zoo and it is called "el zoológico" by locals). The enclosures range from poor to very impressive and the species list includes a couple of rarities. The first row of enclosures is located next to a picknick area and it consists of quite decent enclosures for small monkeys, agouti, parrots, tortoises and tucans, comparable to enclosures in small Dutch zoos like De Paay or Best ("anteater" is named on the map, but the corresponding enclosure was inhabited by young capybaras and amazon parrots). The opposing enclosure for a dark colored tayra isn't bad either, but behind this one is a semi-offshow area with small and hardly decorated enclosures for puma, greater grison and black-headed spider monkeys. Next are a couple of rather small enclosures for small carnivores and currasow, followed by a quite spacious aviary for king vultures and large but unconventional set of enclosures for black-headed spider monkeys. After this section of the park, there is a large forested area with several pathways leading to the star species of Summit: the harpy eagle, Panama's national bird. The aviary is very impressive: it's one of the largest aviaries for a bird of prey I've ever seen, it's has much vegetation, it includes a two storey viewing, and it has a small museum. Next on the route are large enclosures for Baird's tapir, white-tailed deer and jaguar. From the jaguar enclosure, the pathway leads back to the entrance, passing by some ponds with crocodiles (I didn't see one), a large aviary for macaws and a quite standard enclosure for peccaries.

Species list Summit
* Jaguar (Panthera onca)
* Puma (Puma concolor)
* Ocelot (Leopardus pardalis)
* Margay (Leopardus wiedii)
* Neotropical otter (Lontra longicaudis)
* Greater grison (Galictis vittata)
* Tayra (Eira barbata)
* White-nosed coati (Nasua narica)
* Crab-eating fox (Cerdocyon thous)
* Baird’s tapir (Tapirus bairdi)
* White-tailed deer (Odoicoleus virginianus)
* Collared peccary (Pecari tajacu)
* Central American agouti (Dasyprocta punctata)
* Lesser capybara (Hydrochoerus isthmius)
* Black-head spider monkey (Ateles fusciceps)
* Black-handed spider monkey (Ateles geoffroyi)
* White-faced capuchin (Cebus capucinus)
* Yellow squirrel monkey (Saimiri oerstedii)
* Rufous-naped tamarin (Saguinus geoffroyi)

* Harpy eagle (Harpia harpyja)
* King vulture (Sarcoramphus papa)
* American kestrel (Falco sparverius)
* Great curassow (Crax rubra)
* Red-and-green macaw (Ara chloropterus)
* Scarlet macaw (Ara macao)
* Blue-and-yellow macaw (Ara ararauna)
* Red-lored parrot (Amazona autumnalis)
* Souther mealy parrot (Amazona farinosa)
* Yellow-crowned parrot (Amazona ochrocephala)
* Blue-headed parrot (Pionus menstruus)
* Keel-billed toucan (Ramphastos sulfuratus)
* Chestnut-mandibled toucan (Ramphastos swainsonii)
* Great egret (Ardea alba)
* Southern lapwing (Vanellus chilensis)
* Black-bellied whistling duck (Dendrocygna autumnalis)

* American crocodile (Crocodylus acutus)
* Spectacled caiman (Caiman crocodilus)
* Red-footed tortoise (Chelonoidis carbonarius)
* Arrau turtle (Podocnemis expansa)