TomKal foto

It took me a lot of time to decide which bird would be the best for introductory text to  attach to when describing my trip to Costa Rica. Should it be a clay-colored  thrush, which is the national bird of Costa Rica, or one of toucans I managed to photograph there, or may be  an amazing Montezuma  oropendola? The final choice was the resplendent quetzal which is the national bird of Guatemala. An amazing bird of paradise, which is not easy to photograph, even in the place of its occurrence. But before I describe the bird itself, there are a few words about the expedition. Costa Rica is an amazing place, where from the beginning the great number of birds and the ease of shooting is stunning and delightful. For sure it is due to natural environmental conditions but also the attitude of Costa Rica residents towards the birds have a considerable impact on it. It is absolutely forbidden to hunt for birds there and all these by-hotels, by-restaurants and roadside places arranged for "feeding" birds attract visitors. I wrote “feeding” in quotation marks, because the birds can not suffer from the lack of food in the rainforest. For many birds it is tempting to enjoy an easy meal of bananas or rice, and the positive experience they have associating with people makes the birds appear sometimes really close. Of course it turns differently with various species but there are really a lot of them. Within two weeks I managed to take photos of 200 bird species, of course not always with a great success. It was not easy and required a significant effort and determination, but ultimately possible there on Costa Rica. I could encounter some representatives of the species a few times, and I managed to take so many pictures that it was difficult to select the right photos to a gallery without making it boring and overloaded. But on the other hand, sometimes a bird sat down only once and I took one or two photos that form, as yet, modest gallery of the species on my website. But who knows when the opportunity arises to make "the last minute” changes, just like on the occasion of this trip I was able to make changes to the roadside hawk, the rufous-collared sparrow or the southern lapwing galleries. This time I have listed new galleries in the order from the most interesting, multi-photo galleries to those that are of documentary value and evidentiary importance. Starting from the number 88 in the list evidentiary (in my opinion) galleries begin. The ones more interesting are highlighted in bold font. Despite favorable conditions for photographing birds, the number of new species on my site would not be as impressive without my fellow-travelers, their initiative and support. So I have to express my thanks for the support, organization and atmosphere that accompanied our expedition to Tadeusz and Piotr. Natural environment in this style  and such a good company, at least for me, it is the best of nature photography. My warmest regards and thanks go to you both and I hope that three of our cameras can be heard working simultaneously more times in the future. Well, let us back to Costa Rica and bird's stories. I was also able to record voices of some birds. This time I decided to mark it in the list of species with the letter G in brackets - (G). So those who want to hear the voice of a toucan, Montezuma oropendola or rufous-collared sparrow I invite to listen to my recordings. Due to such a large number of new galleries and scarcity of time only to few selected species the description or points of interest will be added. Fortunately, all new species were identified in Costa Rica with help of local guides, which significantly reduced time of work on building the gallery and eliminated the risk of errors in the identification of species. A novelty in my galleries are photos taken with flash. Well, I think it is a misunderstanding of nature photography, but when photographing birds at sunrise at the bottom of the rainforest it is impossible to take clear images, even a documentary one. All the more, even at noon there was not enough light to take satisfactory images. So capturing birds residing in the rain forest undergrowth required a change of my approach to nature photography. Fortunately, there are not many of this kind photos. You can find more descriptions of the specific species in information accompanying the galleries, and now about the amazing resplendent quetzal as it is...

The beauty of resplendent quetzals has always fascinated people. Their feathers ornamented the garments of high rank leaders of the Aztecs and Maya. Already at that time these birds were strictly protected as for killing such a bird the perpetrator was punished with death penalty. The fascination with quetzals has attracted many tourists from all over the world to Costa Rica. In the vicinity of the hotel in which we stayed quetzals live in their natural habitat. They live in rain forests at the height of 1200 to 3000m. They eat insects and fruit, especially avocado. As a response to the news, which was brought to the restaurant, that a quetzal had flown over to a nearby tree, the tourists left their meals and ran out of the building to meet with the quetzal. Unfortunately the bird was sitting quite far on a high tree, and its silhouette was hidden by branches of the tree it was sitting on. In fact it could be seen only with the use of a telescope. To increase the likelihood of encountering a quetzal, and the hotel turnover, every morning at 5 am they organized trips to the place where the birds sought food. About 5 kilometers from the hotel a mountain slope was crossed by a stony way. Below the way there were avocado trees, where the birds fed. After the meal they flew over the road to sit on an isolated tree. At the distance of 30-40 meters from the tree, some time before the sunrise, a group of people gathered, awaiting with excitement their encounter with a quetzal. Unfortunately on the first day only a female quetzal appeared. It was quite dark, she sat on a wire against the sky – I took my first photo of a quetzal, which I’d better not show. Fortunately a little bit later, at a distance of 100 meters, a second female sat down. The group of people peacefully approached the bird sitting on a tree branch and some better pictures were taken. Better, but not good. Sadly we were lacking light, but from this third encounter with a quetzal a few photos were suitable to be uploaded in my gallery. That’s how the morning expectancy ended. Fortunately during the next morning photographing attempt two male quetzals appeared. Finally I was able to take the first photos that show the beauty of this bird. Sadly the second male was sitting much farther, and I could not attach a converter due to lighting conditions. I lacked literally several dozen minutes to be able to take real good quality pictures, which would truly reflect the beautiful plumage of this bird. Unfortunately quetzals flew away just before the sunrise and the last attempt to photograph this bird was over…