REGUA, Atlantic Forest, Brazil: 11 July

With a meeting arranged for this afternoon followed by a sorte to decide where to site a new hide, birding was once again restricted to the wetland and trails near the lodge. Today turned out to be one of the quietest days for bird activity I've experienced at REGUA, but we still had a few reasonable sightings. An Azure-shouldered Tanager over the lodge is a very low altitude record and good numbers of Yellow-legged Thrushes around are mainly altitudinal migrants, moving lower the escape the low temperatures higher up the mountains.

At the wetland 2 Greater Ani, 4 Masked Duck, 1 Striated Heron, 1 Snowy Egret, 4 Wing-banded Hornero, 3 Black-capped Donacobius and 2 Brazilian Tanager were the pick of the bunch, and 1 White-flanked Antwren, 2 Unicoloured Antwren, 1 Plain-winged Woodcreeper, 1 Black-capped Foliage-gleaner, 1 Plain Xenops and 1 Grey-hooded Flycatcher were the highlights along the Brown Trail. The São José Trail was even quieter with a White-necked Hawk being the only noteworthy bird seen. Frustratingly we twice heard a Red-ruffed Fruitcrow but couldn't see it.

Still, all was not lost. A two hour night walk around the wetland resulted in great views of a male Scissor-tailed Nightjar singing from a termite mound (with another 2 heard) as well as several Pauraque and 2 Tawny-browed Owl heard.

REGUA, Atlantic Forest, Brazil: 10 July

Spent a quiet day around the restored wetlands and adjacent forest trails. Highlights at the wetland were 5 Masked Duck, a very unseasonal Streaked Flycatcher (a summer migrant here), 12 Muscovy Duck (a high site count), 1 Ochre-bellied Flycatcher, 1 Lemon-chested Greenlet, 1 Moustached Wren, a very showy Long-billed Wren (photo 1), 1 Green Kingfisher, 2 White-tipped Dove (surprisingly difficult to see well at REGUA), 1 Yellow-legged Thrush and this superb male Chestnut-backed Antshrike (photo 2). A search along the São José Trail for one of REGUA's speciality birds, Shrike-like Cotinga, drew a blank, but a very brief Toco Toucan, my first at REGUA, more than made up for it! Other species seen on a quick visit to this trail include 1-2 White-barred Piculet, 1 Black-cheeked Gnateater, 2-3 Lesser Woodcreeper, 3 Yellow-legged Thrush, 1 Grey-hooded Attila, 4 Black-goggled Tanager, 1 Flame-crested Tanager, 1 Ruby-crowned Tanager, 1 Rufous-headed Tanager and 3 Yellow-backed Tanager.

A night walk along the excellent Onofre Cunha Trail this evening produced incredible views of Giant Snipe down to 2 metres (photo 3), with another 2 birds heard, along with 2 Black-banded Owl and a Common Potoo (another was also heard). Unfortunately a calling Tawny-browed Owl refused to show for us, but maybe next time.

REGUA, Atlantic Forest, Brazil: 9 July

Arrived in Rio de Janeiro at 5:30 this morning after a mainly sleepless overnight flight. The early morning two hour drive north-east to REGUA in the Serra dos Órgãos mountains produced the usual common birds including several Little Blue Heron in Guanabara Bay, a Savannah Hawk, 2 Ringed Kingfisher and a Burrowing Owl. On arrival at REGUA's Guapi Assu Bird Lodge all traces of tiredness were forgotten with the sight of the fruit and hummingbird feeders heaving with birds. Good numbers of Swallow-tailed Hummingbirds, 60 Maroon-bellied Parakeets and lots of Blue Dacnis (photo 1) on the bananas made great viewing in the garden. 1 Rufous-breasted Hermit, several Violet-capped Woodnymphs and Glittering-throated Emeralds and a Yellow-lored Tody-Flycatcher (photo 2) were amongst the other species seen.

A walk to the new wetland hide to look for Boat-billed Heron failed to find any of these charismatic birds, but the sun was quite intense and they were probably just taking cover in the shade. However, the REGUA wetland is very birdy and it was good to take it easy getting reacquainted with the more common species. Most noteworthy were 1 Rufescent Tiger-Heron, 2 Capped Heron, 1 Aplomado Falcon, 1 Blue-winged Parrotlet, 2 Tropical Screech-Owl (at the usual roost site), 1+ Lesser Swallow-tailed Swift, 3 Chestnut-backed Antshrike, 2 Rufous Hornero (photo 3), 1 Yellow-browed Tyrant (one of my favourite Tyrant-Flycatchers), 2+ Grey-breasted Martin and 1 Fawn-breasted Tanager. Also this Great Kiskadee (photo 4) provided excellent entertainment diving into the water after small prey items!

Back to the Bird Continent

I am about depart for a two week trip to Brazil's endemic-rich Atlantic Forest. One of the world's top biodiversity hotspots, the Atlantic Forest, or Mata Atlântica as its known in Brazil, stretches along the coast of south-east Brazil into coastal Uruguay and inland into north-east Argentina and eastern Paraguay. Geographically isolated from other forested areas of South America, the Atlantic Forest has a high degree of endemism, and supports about 200 endemic bird species!

Once again I'll be staying at Guapi Assu Bird Lodge located at REGUA, an Atlantic Forest reserve in Rio state and my foreign patch (photo below). REGUA spans two Endemic Bird Areas identified by BirdLife International - the Atlantic forest lowlands and the Atlantic forest mountains. So far an incredible 456 species have been recorded on the Reserve, including 118 Atlantic Forest endemics and 62 Brazilian Endemics! The Atlantic Forest is also one of the world's most threatened ecosystems with only around 7% of the original forested area remaining and virtually all of the lowland Atlantic Forest destroyed. REGUA contains a large area of continuous lowland forest which makes it an important reserve.

Since my last trip 14 months ago REGUA has planted another 32,500 native trees (105,000 now planted in total), purchased another 35 ha of rainforest, built a second hide at the wetland, opened a new laboratory at the conservation centre, landscaped the lodge gardens and developed new trails. I can't wait to see for myself how much things have changed!

Red Fox kill

The local Red Foxes have successfully raised two cubs which have been visible most evenings over the last week or so, playing at the back of a neighbours garden, while an adult stands guard sitting on a shed roof! The cubs are now well grown and this evening one of them made its first kill, a Wood Pigeon. It decided to bring its prize into our back garden where it proceeded to get stuck in, at one point even burying part of it in our flower bed (nice)!



In keeping with tradition, I decided to shoot this video 'Cream Tea Birder style', you know, with the trademark camera shake and the animal rarely, if ever, looking at the camera!

New Forest: 19th - 21st June

The aim of this trip was to search for Honey Buzzard and as many heathland specialities as we could find over three days. But once again our plans were scuppered by bad weather (this time persistent heavy rain being the culprit) as well as the impeccable timing of a flu virus that decided to wipe me out for the duration of the trip, so we were far from successful.

Things couldn't have got off to a slower start when an evening walk around the heathland at Beaulieu Road on the 19th produced just a single Curlew, 2 Stonechat and a Reed Bunting! These weren't the highlights, this was about all that we saw! The 20th was our only full day and we had planned to spend several hours looking for Honey Buzzard, but being very overcast and with heavy rain predicted we decided to try for some of the specialities at Boulderwood instead. Fortunately the rain held off long enough for us to find several Firecrest (although only one was actually seen), 2 Wood Warbler, 2 Common Redstart (a female and a nice spotted juvenile), a lone Common Crossbill singing, several Siskin, 1 Treecreeper, 1 Grey Wagtail and a Roe Deer, but unfortunately photo opportunities amounted to nil.

Our final day dawned overcast and windy but at least it had stopped raining. I felt so rough by this point that we decided to spend the few hours we had left before we had to head home walking along the River Beaulieu from our hotel at Bucklers Hard to Beaulieu village. Birds were noticable by there absence (1 Redshank and 1 Little Egret being about it), but the wildflower meadows along this route were full of Common Spotted Orchid Dactylorhiza fuchsii (photo 1), Bitter Vetch Lathyrus linifolius (photo 2), Bird’s-foot-trefoil Lotus corniculatus (photo 3) and Meadow Vetchling Lathyrus pratensis (photo 4).

Subbuteo not playing ball

Haven't had a chance to get out birding of late, so a Hobby hunting insects over the garden at dusk this evening was much appreciated, even if it did fly off every time I pointed the camera at it! A few years back a pair nested in a large tree viewable from my house, so maybe this bird is nesting nearby and I'll get another chance at a shot? The only other bird of note seen in the last week or so has been a Red Kite heading east over the A283 near Sullington in West Sussex on 4th June.