Birding the Central Andes Part 2

In my previous post I shared about birding in the Cloud Forests of Otun Quimbaya and Rio Blanco. In this post we head to higher altitudes to explore Andean Forests and Paramo habitats.

Day 3 – Hacienda El Bosque (High Andean Forest)

This site was, and still is, an active farm but they are pro-actively making room for nature and for birders to come and visit. It is a professional setup with good feeders and viewing points.

We started looking for Antpittas but inevitably saw other birds at the same time. Both the Crescent-Faced and Equatorial Antpittas were added to our growing list along with Brown-Backed & Yellow-Bellied Chat-Tyrants, Grey-Browed & Slaty Brushfinch’s, Golden-Fronted Redstart and the charismatic Barred Fruiteater.

There were great hummingbird feeders and the strong light provided some good photographic opportunities. Sparkling Violetears kept fighting and chasing each other which in particular proved a nice focus to capture these dynamic moments. The Sword-Billed Hummingbird has the longest beak of any hummingbird and really stood out too.

But it was another hummingbird that really captured my attention as a photographer and it quite possibly has the coolest bird name ever – Shining Sunbeam!

Other birds also deserving special mention include the Andean Guan, Grey-Breasted Mountain Toucan, White Throated Quail-Dove, Lacrimose Mountain Tanager (all photographed below) plus Paramo Seedeater and White-Browed Spinetail. Great stuff.

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Nevado del Ruiz (Paramo)

Continuing up the road the altitude increased until we reached the highest road in Colombia and Paramo habitat. We visited the national park of Nevado del Ruiz going as high as 4,138m. At this altitude the quantity of birds is low but the quality of those you see is something else. The Buffy Helmetcrest is a hummingbird carving out a living in this unique habitat. Plain-Coloured Seedeater, Plumbeous Sierra Finch, Andean Tit-Spintail and Andean Duck all also put in an appearance. Driving along the road a Stout-Billed Cinclodes kindly flew onto a post to add itself to our life lists.

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Termales del Ruiz (High Andean Forest)

We then continued down a different side of the mountain to the Hotel Termales del Ruiz. The hotel grounds provided attractive habitat and feeders to attract birds from the surrounding High Andean Forest. It also hosted some natural hot springs so we had the somewhat surreal experience of seeing bathrobe and swimming costumed guests enjoying the pools surrounded by birders with binoculars and long camera lenses.

Making sure to point my optics in the direction of our feathered friends we added several new hummingbirds and other high altitude specialists. The monstrous “boots” of the Golden-Breasted Puffleg deserves special mention along with the crest and rump of the Rainbow-Bearded Thorntail. So far on this trip we have seen over 80 species of Hummingbird and it is hard to remember them all but they are all wonderful and charismatic in their own way.

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We were grateful on this day to have the super guiding and logistical support of Adventures Colombia and in particular Pablo and Luz.

Follow our birding adventure in Central Andes with Part 3.