January 30, 2022
Birding in Inírida is not as straightforward as simply visiting a trail and going for a walk. With a few exceptions, most of the great birding sites are located near small Indigenous communities located outside of the town of Inírida. These communities charge entrance fees of varying amounts, while most also require that a member of the community escort the birding group. Sometimes, this has to be arranged in advance.
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| Amazonian Antshrike - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
For our first full day in Inírida we opted to visit the community of Sabanitas. A footpath leaves the main community area and traverses an area of open savannah before entering the forest for several kilometers. This path is used by locals to travel to clusters of houses further away from the main community, but it passes through high quality forest and is a popular spot for birding.
We made the short drive over in Mario's van and parked beside a pedestrian bridge used to access the community on the far bank of the river. A Sunbittern right at the bridge was a nice surprise. It wasn't concerned at all with our presence, allowing me to take some nice photos of it.
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| Sunbittern - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
We met the leader of the Sabanitas community and he chose to escort us for the walk. Before discussing the day's sightings, a brief note on our experience with visiting Sabanitas...
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| Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
Birders wishing to visit Sabanitas should expect to pay through the nose for the privilege of hiking their trails. We were charged 80,000 pesos each (around 27 Canadian dollars) which included lunch, and at the end of the trip the chief tried to extract another 80,000 pesos to pay for Mario's entrance fee, even though normally he wouldn't be charged to join us. If we had known ahead of time, we would have asked Mario to stay behind. Some of the other communities that we visited had more reasonable rates, such as Matraca which charged 20,000 pesos per person. We felt conflicted. On the one hand, it is great that these local communities can receive some extra income from ecotourism, and we are grateful that they are willing to open their trails to foreign visitors. But on the other hand, we felt that we were being gouged price-wise. It seemed like it was just a money grab and nowhere else in Colombia were we charged so much to hike a trail.
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| Turkey Vulture - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
Laura and I also saw fewer birds at Sabanitas because the chief insisted on joining us. He spent most of the hike loudly talking and continually coughing; Laura and I at least managed to hang back so we could still see a few birds here and there. But, enough of the negatives. The birding here was phenomenal!
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| LaFresnaye's Piculet - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
The first stretch of the trail passed through a natural savannah. We noted a wide variety of species including our first Yellow-crowned Manakin, a bird with a disjunct range in northern Amazonia which is often found in seasonally flooded white-sand forests. Other early species in our walk included Bare-necked Fruitcrow, Sulphury Flycatcher and a heard-only Wedge-tailed Grass-Finch.
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| Birding (and eBirding) at Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
The trail passed close to the forest's edge and we encountered a little mixed flock. Included with the lot were our first Cherrie's Antwrens, another localized species that can be common in the right areas at Inírida.
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| Cherrie's Antwren - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
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| Chestnut-fronted Macaw - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
Despite it being barely 7 AM, the morning sun had crested the scrubby trees ringing the savannah, and was scorching us. We eagerly entered the forest, taking refuge in the relatively cool environs of the mature trees. Of course there was a tradeoff as we now had to deal with biting insects. Being Canadian, a few measly mosquitoes did not faze us at all. I insist that nothing can compare with June mosquitoes in a Canadian bog.
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| Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
The birding was quiet at first in the forest, but it was a matter of quality, not quantity. First up was a handsome Ivory-billed Aracari in the canopy.
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| Ivory-billed Aracari - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
I stopped for my first White-lored Tyrannulet, followed shortly by a small group of Velvet-fronted Grackles moving through the mid-story of the forest.
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| Velvet-fronted Grackle - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
And then, the biggest surprise of the whole Inírida trip happened. Laura and I were hanging back from the other two, listening to the forest, when we heard a commotion that sounded like birds harassing something. The chipping and scolding notes sounded closer and out of the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of a huge raptor soaring through the canopy over our path. Laura had also briefly seen the bird, and we wondered out loud what it could be. I said to her, half-seriously, that it kind of reminded me of a Crested Eagle. We stood peering into the canopy and suddenly Laura let out a burst of profanities. She had found the bird! Through a tiny window in the canopy there, in all its glory, was an adult Crested Eagle. We were dumbfounded!
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| Crested Eagle - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
During the commotion I only managed a couple of photos that were properly exposed, and it was facing away for these. We only observed the bird for 15 or 20 seconds in total before it lifted off and vanished from sight. If I did not have the photographic proof the whole encounter would have seemed dream-like and too good to be true. But there, on the back of my camera screen, was an adult Crested Eagle.
This is one of those holy-grail species that few birders have seen away from active nests. Laura and I had visited several Crested Eagle nests over the years but had not connected with this species, and finding one on our own in the forest was so much more satisfying. What a bird. We wished that the encounter was a little longer, but beggars can't be choosers when it comes to Crested Eagles!
Needless to say, the rest of the hike was a bit of a blur as we were still on cloud nine. The birding remained good and we added a few more lifers - Ocellated Woodcreeper, Black-bellied Cuckoo and White-browed Purpletuft.
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| White-browed Purpletuft - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
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| Black-bellied Cuckoo - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
Though the eagle stole the show, it was an excellent day for cotingas as well. We noted seven species (not counting the purpletufts which are no longer in the cotinga family). A male Pompadour Cotinga was a huge highlight for us; a lifer for Laura, and the first time I had seen a perched individual.
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| Pompadour Cotinga - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
Surely there are not many birds in the world that have the colour of a Pompadour Cotinga!
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| Pompadour Cotinga - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
For many birders visiting Inírida, high up their target list is one of the strangest cotingas in the world: the Capuchinbird. Laura and I had seen them previously in Guyana but were keen on another view of them, especially since this would be Laura's first encounter since switching to the dark side and calling herself a birder. We heard the other-worldly call of a Capuchinbird on a few occasions - some say it sounds like a mooing cow, others say it resembles a distant lawnmower - and we eventually saw one not far off the trail. Its physical appearance is even stranger than the odd vocalizations that it produces.
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| Capuchinbird - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
The birding slowed as the morning progressed, causing me to shift focus to insects.
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| Orange Banner (Temenis laothoe) - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
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| Heliconius antiochus - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
We were trudging a little bit on the walk back until we stumbled across a small understory flock which contained White-flanked and Gray Antwrens and Black-chinned Antbirds.
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| White-flanked Antwren - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
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| Black-chinned Antbird - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
Just as we left the forest behind, we heard the distinctive calls of several Yellow-crowned Manakins. We tracked one down for great looks and photos.
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| Yellow-crowned Manakin - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
Tired and hungry from our walk, we enjoyed a delicious dinner that was cooked for us by several women in the community. This fish is related to the piranhas, and boy did it go down well.
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| Lunch - Sabanitas, Inírida, Guainía, Colombia |
Our visit to Sabanitas might have been much more expensive than we had hoped, but it was a very birdy day with quite a few highlights!
