Costa Rica 2011 Part 7: Monteverde Cloud Forest and Butterfly Garden

We see blue crowned mot mots alongside the road as we drive to Monteverde. In Monteverde we walk along the Sendero Nuboso Trail.

We hear the metallic call of a black faced solitary. We see Cecropia and Sheflera trees.  Cala is a very fragrant plant with white dots inside that will become fruits.

Black guans are dark birds that eat insects and fruit. We saw two of them in the trees.We saw a hummingbird with a blue head guarding flowers. A medium sized non venemous dark Clelia snake was seen nearby the trail.

At the lop of the trail there is a lookout but the view is completely blocked by clouds and mist and you can barely see 20m away. You can see the clouds moving as you watch.

At the lookout

Duchman's pipe

Little avocado have red and green fruit. This is what quetzels eat. A pair of quetzels were seen nesting at the begining of Sender Jose Tosi trail at the first turn. We watched as they chased away a quatemonde from their nest.

Questel

Small hummingbird

At the hummingbird gallery we see many hummingbirds of all different sizes and colours:
Green violet ear
Violet sabrewing
Green crowned brilliant
Purple throated mountain gem

 I wish we had more time to spend at Monteverde. This is one of my favorite places and even though I have been there twice now I still plan on coming back.





After going to the cloud forest we visit the Monteverde Butterfly Garden. We see scorpions, tarantulas, ox beetles, elephant beetles, bess beetles, jewel scarabs, milipedes, centipedes, walking sticks and praying mantis. Some of the many butterflies we see are: blue morphos, owl butterflies, halloween butterfly, swallowtail, zebra, postman, longwing, Julias, clearwing, ruby patch, Mecuna and Sarahs.

  At El Bosque Lodge I see a blue crowned mot mot, emerald tucan, tarantula hawk wasp catching a tarantula, cockroaches, brown jays and agutis.

Emerald tucan

Tarantula hawk wasp and it's prey

Blue crowned mot mot