Our Puerto Rico Month is almost over (having said that we’ll probably keep it going for a while yet as I’m really enjoying writing about an island I knew virtually nothing about and which turns out be so darn interesting!), and I’m extremely grateful to Mike aka Noflickster, author of the wonderful The Feather and the Flower blog, for contributing a really evocative post about living and birding on Puerto Rico in the late 1990s…

Mike said in mails to me while he was preparing this post that he wasn’t sure it was relevant enough given it was about experiences he had some years back: in my opinion it’s just about perfect, and if I’d wanted to get to PR before I read it, I was almost out on my way to the travel agent straight after finishing it. Enjoy, folks, and thanks again Mike…

La Isla de Encanto,
Written by Noflickster at The Feather and the Flower blog

Our friends at 10000birds.com could not have picked a location more deserving of a month-long theme than Puerto Rico. Everything about “La Isle del Encanto” - the Enchanted Island - is worth exploring at least once in this lifetime, something I say though I’m not a native nor current Puertorriqueno. But after a mere three month immersion in PR’s natural and social heritage, I am in heart.

Photo copyright Kevin Loughlin (Wildside Nature Tours).

I didn’t come to know PR as a typical tourist. In 1997 my then-girlfriend, now-wife spent her fall semester working with the Forest Service in the Caribbean NF (now the El Yunque NF) as part of her doctoral research on slime molds. I happily accompanied her as a research assistant, taking the opportunity to join two additional and equally non-avian research projects in El Yunque. Not only would I be almost always outdoors, I would often be in the company of Forest Service biologists, local naturalists, and visiting professors with their students. In short, almost always swimming in a bioluminescent bay of knowledge and experience not offered by guide books. Couple that with research permits that allowed access to locations not open to the general public, I would be in naturalist’s heaven.

Before I continue remember this is 1997, and Things Change. Our trip came before all the amenities “modern day” naturalists readily have at their disposal now: no GPS, no iPhone, no cell phone, no eBird, no digital camera. We relied on topo maps, pay phones, Excel spreadsheets, and a bulky SLR. Also, the island has changed in the intervening 12 years - things I mention here may not hold true anymore. Finally, avian taxonomy has changed and some species names I use may be a bit archaic. Now that I’ve distinguished how old and outdated I am, please indulge my walk down memory lane…

We descended into San Juan from the darkened sky on a balmy September night, picked up a rental car, and headed the hour east to our new home. While navigating the roads and traffic I wondered what the dawn would bring, what would the first bird be on this adventure? Bananaquit was as far as I got, you need to pay close attention to your driving when traffic “laws” are treated more like “suggestions.”

Puerto Rican Screech-owl.
Photo copyright Alberto López-Torres (puertoricanwildlifephotography.blogspot.com

It turned out we wouldn’t have to wait until morning to observe that first bird. Near midnight, as we pulled into our driveway, we were nearly deafened by Coquis (photo left © Alberto López-Torres puertoricanwildlifephotography.blogspot.com) calling from all directions. Behind their wall of sound were overlapping trills from Puerto Rican Screech-owls. Though we heard them frequently throughout our stay we didn’t have any sightings until December, shortly before our departure. Driving through our neighborhood, admiring the expansive Christmas light displays, we saw a single owl perched on a phone wire.

Of course, owls weren’t the only neighborhood birds. Our backyard fruit trees attracted many species, easily viewed while cooking or washing dishes through the large, panoramic window. Many disappeared in the blink of an eye as they landed - if you didn’t see the Orange-fronted Parakeets fly in you’d miss them completely. “Typical” backyard birds like Bananaquits, Zenaida Doves, and Smooth-billed Anis were common visitors.

Red-legged Thrush. Photo Mike Bergin

The word “endemic” used to conjure thoughts of grueling hikes, patient stalking, and fleeting glimpses, but the Puerto Rican Emerald and Puerto Rican Woodpecker, both endemic to PR and regular visitors to our yard, proved those notions false. On some occasions dishes were left partially washed to appreciate uncommon visitors, such as a solo Prairie Warbler, a fly-by Scaly-naped Pigeon, a PR Lizard-cuckoo, or Mangrove Cuckoo. The neighborhood’s shrubs and grasses were home to introduced African finches, like Pin-tailed Wydah, Bronze and Nutmeg Mannikins, and Tricolored Munias.

My wife’s research took us through gated roads to access portions of El Yunque’s four forest types away from the madding crowds. Three are named after the dominant tree species (Tabonuco, Palo Colorado, and Sierra Palm) and one after the perpetual climate it endured (Cloud Forest, also known as the Elfin or Dwarf Forest).

Though these habitats are accessible in the touristy part of the National Forest, away from the buses and day-trippers it was easy to imagine you had the island to yourself, sharing it only with the wildlife. We regularly encountered sought-after endemic birds such as PR Todys, Lizard-cuckoos, Tanagers, Vireos, and Flycatchers, along with less-desirable species like Pearly-eyed Thrashers (photo left, copyright Kevin Loughlin), which depredate any bird nest they could find. Familiar warblers, such as Northern Parulas, Black-and-white Warblers, American Redstarts, and Black-throated Blue Warblers, settled in for the their non-breeding season, joining resident Loggerhead and Gray Kingbirds, Red-legged Thrushes, and Greater Antillean Orioles. Louisiana Waterthrushes regularly flushed from the mountain roads during our drives (Northern Waterthrushes are also common, but in the coastal mangroves).

Green-throated Carib. Photo copyright Kevin Loughlin (Wildside Nature Tours).

Puerto Rican Tody. Photo copyright Kevin Loughlin (Wildside Nature Tours).

Puerto Rican Flycatcher. Photos copyright Karoline Mena (karomc80@yahoo.com).

Gray and Loggerhead Kingbirds. Photos copyright Kevin Loughlin (Wildside Nature Tours).

My fieldwork during the latter part of the fall was mostly solitary, preparing plots for a vegetation succession study. This entailed finding the landslides marked on a map, all in various states of regeneration, and most requiring a good hike in from the nearest road. Perhaps needless to say, those walks in the woods were opportune birding times.

These walks generally yielded the same now-familiar species, except for a possible encounter with Puerto Rican Parrots. An earlier encounter, which I highlighted on my own blog (under the “I can laugh about it now” category), turned out to be a colossal failing to account for all necessary field marks. But this time, while setting up a plot on a landslide a good hike in from any drivable road, a small flock of parrots raucously passed overhead, flying through the treetops and across my incomplete plot. I bolted, chasing them as far as I could, but never found them.

Given the location I suspect they were five of the forty-or-so Puerto Rican Parrots that existed in the wild in ‘97 [for an update on the 2009 population go to Breeding season update] . Exotic parrots, such as White-fronted and Red-crowned Parrots, left to their own devices, are apparently only found in the coastal lowlands. Here I was up in the mountains. Seems plausible, perhaps likely, they were PR Parrots. Perhaps my thinking is merely wishful, also plausible. Or even likely.

When I wasn’t focused on botany or slime molds I helped track radio-tagged Puerto Rican Boa Constrictors to learn about home ranges and movement patterns, part of a larger effort to assess potential pressure on the Puerto Rican Parrots. Seems like a variation on the conservation biologist’s riddle, what do you do when an endangered animal eats endangered plants*? The endangered PR Boas, typically a lowland species, were reportedly colonizing higher altitudes, moving towards habitats favored by the endangered, cavity-nesting PR Parrots. PR Boas are known to prey on eggs found in cavities.

Though exhilarating, the work was exhausting, and we did need breaks from the work week. The fleet vehicle from the Forest Service came with restrictions that limited where we could go and when. On the one hand, that was fine, we got to know the eastern end of the island really well. In addition to our research sites we could legitimately go to local towns (Luquillo, Palmer, Rio Grande, Fajardo), providing we parked somewhere reasonable. “Don’t park in front of the bar,” we were told with a wink, “but in front of the laundromat down the street. And not at the beach, but at the restaurant near the entrance.” Recommendations, if these 1997 hotspots still exist in 2009: ‘Lolita’s’ for their cheap but amazing “Super-burrito,” a once-a-week staple for students and research techs; La Parilla (aka “Kiosko #2″) in the line of famous kiosks offering food and drink at Luquillo Beach; and El Flamboyan (not what you think, it’s named after a tree, Delonix regia) for drinks, shooting pool with locals, and the juke box. Where else would hear several dozen Puertorriquenos and Puertorriquenas enthusiastically singing word-for-word with Marc Anthony or Maná in Spanish, immediately followed, word-for-word, by “Hotel California”?

Adelaide’s Warbler. Photo © Vanessa Ortiz

On the other hand, we didn’t want to miss out on the rest of the island’s rich diversity. We aimed to visit the offshore islands, the dry forest in the southwest, the central karst region, the beaches, and coral reefs. There were more than birds to savor, there are the cities and towns, the people and culture, the cuisine (admittedly tough-but-manageable for vegetarians, just don’t ask too many questions). We couldn’t return to the States without experiencing as much as possible. So, on a few occasions we rented a car for the weekend or hooked up with a self-sufficient friend and explored.

Locations we targeted included:

• Guanica to Cabo Rojo - the southwestern stretch of the island offers Yellow-shouldered Blackbirds in La Parguera, PR Nightjars at Guanica (I’m told, I can’t verify that directly: we missed them!), salt flats and shorebirds.
• Maricao - just staying at the Hacienda Juanita is worth the trip to the western mountains, but it was also the best place to look for Elfin-woods Warbler. Avian diversity in the western forests, it turns out, is higher than the diversity in the rainforest.
• Humacao Wildlife Refuge - on the southeastern coast, a “tapestry of lagoons, forests, beaches, and swamps”, an amazing place for a variety of waterfowl (West Indian Whistling-duck, White-cheeked Pintail, Caribbean Coot) and songbirds.
• Culebra and Vieques - islands off the eastern end of PR, most wonderful for swimming, snorkeling, and pina coladas on the beach. The ferry rides serve as mini-pelagic trips, with Royal Terns, Magnificent Frigatebirds, Brown Boobies, Brown Pelicans, and — if lucky - a Red-billed Tropicbird (I was lucky on our trip to Vieques).

That’s barely scratching the surface. I could write pages about each spot, an intention I have with my own blog (when physicists figure out how to fit more hours into the day!).

Thank you, Charlie, for letting me ramble about my PR experience, and kudos to the 10,000 Birds folks for highlighting such an underrated birding destination. I hope when (not if) you visit Puerto Rico you’ll experience these sites and come away as satisfied, as fulfilled, as I did.

Photo copyright Kevin Loughlin (Wildside Nature Tours).

* So, what do you do when an endangered animal eats endangered plants? http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_do_you_do_when_a_endangered_animal_eats_endangered_plants

• Like to see what else we’ve posted for ‘Puerto Rico Month’? Just click http://10000birds.com/tag/puerto-rico-month

 

• If you live in Puerto Rico or have visited PR and would like to contribute photos or a guest post (return traffic to your blog/website should be good, folks) then please mail charlie10000birds AT gmail DOT com

Like to see La Isla de Encanto and its wonderful birds for yourself?

Of course you would, so why not enter our FREE competition to win an “Endemic Dash” tour around the island with Kevin Loughlin and Wildside Nature Tours…

Click the rather artistic image on the left and you’ll be transported in an instant to the competition questions and rules.