Unsure that we’d actually see the Resplendent Quetzal, I tell Bob we should take a tour at Finca Lerida, just in case the guide can help us find one. After breakfast, we meet up with our guide, Alberto. Alberto, it turns out, is quite knowledgeable about Finca Lerida operations and growing coffee, but less about birds.
From him, I learn that coffee trees can last up to 25 years, but if they start to look diseased, they plant a new tree beside and cut it down. Finca Lerida uses very few chemicals if none—I think they might use an anti-nematode chemical, otherwise nothing. The coffee plants sometimes get nematodes or another insect. To grow the new plants, they take a seed, plant it, when it sprouts, they move it to another container for 7 months, then transfer it into the ground. The coffee is picked and packed in 30lb bags by the pickers (mostly indigenous), who are paid a minimum of $425 for the season, $3 for each 30lb bag, and all of their housing and food supplied. Panama has a state medical insurance. The Panamanian President’s family owned Finca Lerida, but it was sold and placed under a non-profit management. The hotel was built in 2004, but an addition is being built now. At one time, Finca Lerida had a dairy operation, but apparently it couldn’t compete against Netherland butter (a possible exchange for all the Chiquita bananas we see shipped back?) and the area has been replanted. No more trees are cut on the property. The coffee is sort of shade grown—some large trees within the coffee plants provide shade to many plants, and the hedge row/forest fringe provides more. They often sees a light mist of rain.
After wandering past many coffee and other trees and a vine called “kill tree” that will cover a tree and kill it within 1-2 years, we reach forested area. We take a walk (missing most birds but surprisingly see the nightingale out in the open and then although we hear the song many more times, never see it again) up to several lookouts where we can see the Pacific Ocean and the farm operations on Finca Lerida and a neighbor that has truck farm operations—this is where the irrigation water flowing down the property in pipes goes partially.
Then we head down the Cascades path—which is rocky and has some difficult places on the trail where one can slip. The trail leads eventually to a lookout of another waterfall. Then we start hearing the Resplendant Quetzal. We see three different males—what a treat. The blue tail looks turquoise against the native greenery, the red bright, the tail curls on the end. He’s simply stunning while his mate is just prettier than a Trogan. We hear the Bell birds and others see it, but not us.
After our return along the Cascades path, we take the el Roble trail which is much narrower and follows a huge number of old trees down to the coffee trees. The hike is a delight and we find others staying at the hotel sign up for a coffee tour.
After a good lunch, we return up to where we hiked in the morning with Alberto and bird the forest fringe in search of all the birds we heard and missed and find quite a few, but it rains, then gets chilly so we wear our ponchos. When Bob’s feet start hurting, we head back, finding the Acorn Woodpecker as a surprising close to the day—the picture in the bird guide is far too white compared to the yellowish faces we see.
Chestnut-capped Brush Finch, Ruddy-capped Nightingale Thrush, Black Vulture, Resplendent Quetzals (male), Yellowish Flycatcher, Green Violetear (hummingbird), Slaty Flower-Piercer, Rufous-collared Sparrow, White-naped Brush Finch, Yellow-bellied Siskin, Yellow-faced Grassquit (in nest), Rufous-tailed Hummingbird, Slate-throated Redstart, Flame-colored Tanager, Black-cheeked Warbler, White-tipped Dove, Acorn Woodpecker, Clay-colored Thrush, Blue-gray Tanager
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