VENTFLASH #101 August 17, 2009
Posted by Victor Emanuel
Victor Emanuel
Victor Emanuel started birding in Texas 62 years ago at the age of eight. His travels have taken him to all the continents, with his areas of concentration being Texas, Ari...Dear Friends,
As I write this VENTFLASH, I am on a plane back to Austin after co-leading our summer youth camp, Camp Cascades, with Barry Lyon and Louise Zemaitis. Ten boys and three girls joined us for two weeks in Washington state. We had a marvelous time. Highlights included over 3,000 Rhinoceros Auklets seen from the ferry to Port Townsend; Varied Thrushes singing in spruce trees while mist rose from the valley below Cascade Pass; a family group of White-tailed Ptarmigan; both Sooty and Dusky grouse; six American Three-toed Woodpeckers; Sage Thrashers; and much more. We walked trails through awe-inspiring old growth forests, observed an incredible wildflower display, and saw a wonderful selection of birds, mammals, and other creatures.
Our flagship youth camp, Camp Chiricahua, based in Southeast Arizona, was also very successful. In some ways it was our most successful camp ever because it accomplished something only one other VENT tour has ever done: add a new bird species to the U.S. list with the discovery of a Brown-backed Solitaire in Miller Canyon. VENT has conducted youth birding and nature camps every summer for 23 years. We regard them as a way in which we can contribute to the lives of young people. Our camps are designed for boys and girls ages 14–18. We operate Camp Chiricahua every summer and usually offer another camp at another destination. Those of us who are involved with these camps regard them as some of the hardest work we do all year, but also the most satisfying.
In this issue:
LETTER FROM A YOUTH CAMPER PARENT
NEW 2010 CATALOGS ON THE WAY
LATE SUMMER/EARLY FALL TRAVEL OPPORTUNITIES
TOUR REPORTS
FINAL THOUGHTS
LETTER FROM A YOUTH CAMPER PARENT
This summer, Fernanda Zorilla, a teenage girl from Monterrey, Mexico, attended Camp Chiricahua in Southeast Arizona. Fernanda received a scholarship in memory of Nathaniel Gerhart, a former camper who passed away two years ago. Following the camp, I received a letter from her mother. I wanted to share her letter with you as a way of imparting how important our summer youth camps are to me and how much of a positive influence I think they are on the young people who attend.
"Hola Victor,
I am writing to thank you again for giving my daughter, Fernanda, the opportunity to attend Camp Chiricahua.
I am glad to say that she had the best experience of her life. She loved the camp and couldn't stop talking about how great it was. Both leaders, Rob (Day) and Dave (Jasper) were amazing. She said the combination of both leaders made the camp so enjoyable and an incredible learning experience for her. They knew all about birds (of course!) but also about plants, butterflies, reptiles (snakes were the highlight), insects, etc., which made opportunities to learn so abundant. Rob attended to every detail with perfection. The meals were all excellent, everything went so smoothly, and Dave had so much energy and enthusiasm and knew about everything there. She also talked about other campers and how everybody got along so well and how she made really good friendships with them. Everybody helped her and was very respectful and had great dispositions. She was so happy to meet so many nice people who were so much fun. She was also amazed at the level of knowledge the group had.
The birding was amazing with owling being one of her favorite activities. The sighting of the Brown-backed Solitaire was very exciting for her, although it is one of our familiar birds where we live and sings one of our favorite bird songs. It was a great experience for her to be part of Arizona/U.S. ornithological history.
Please send my thanks to Rob and Dave, and please give the Gerhart family my personal thanks for funding her scholarship.
Saludos,
Diana Zorilla"
NEW 2010 CATALOGS ON THE WAY
As always, the publication of the new VENT tour catalogs is a much anticipated event. I am excited to announce that our 2010 tour catalogs have been printed and will be mailed in the next two weeks. Beautiful cover art and an assemblage of outstanding photographs will make these catalogs as handsome a production as we have ever had. But you do not have to wait to receive your catalog to find out about the tours VENT is offering. Our website, www.ventbird.com offers a complete, up-to-date listing of all VENT tours. Furthermore, you can simply click on the link, ventbird.com/new-tours-in-2010-2011, to view a list of our new and exciting tour offerings in 2010 and 2011.
LATE SUMMER/EARLY FALL TRAVEL OPPORTUNITIES
Many of our late summer and early fall tours are full, but a few spaces remain available on these fine tours:
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Greater Shearwater— Photo: Barry Zimmer |
Autumn Grand Manan, August 31-September 6, 2009 with Barry Zimmer and Brennan Mulrooney; $2,955 in double occupancy from Bangor, Maine. Limit 12. 1 space available.
Join Barry Zimmer and Brennan Mulrooney for this wonderful short trip which begins and ends in Bangor, Maine and travels to peaceful Grand Manan, a lovely island off the coast of New Brunswick. With its quaint houses, rugged coastline, and lack of traffic, Grand Manan is like Maine used to be 50 or more years ago. Famed Nebraska writer, Willa Cather, spent many summers on Grand Manan. The seabirds, whales, and fall warblers on this trip are marvelous.
Indonesia: Lesser Sunda Islands, September 14-October 4, 2009 with Susan Myers; $8,175 in double occupancy from Denpasar, Bali. Limit 8. 1 space available.
The Indonesian islands known as the Lesser Sundas stretch across the Java Sea north of Australia between the islands of New Guinea and Bali. They are part of a unique biogeographic region known as Wallacea, which contains a distinctive fauna representing a mix of Asian and Australian species. This region has a dry tropical climate which has given rise to a natural habitat composed of monsoon forests and savannah woodlands. These distinctive seasonal dry forests harbor a unique wildlife and are home to more than 70 endemic bird species, with new species still being discovered. Participants will enjoy fabulous birding, experience ancient cultures, and meet delightful friendly people who are keen to extend a warm welcome to visiting birders.
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Cape May Warbler— Photo: Michael O'Brien |
Cape May, Hawk Mountain & Bombay Hook, September 27-October 4, 2009 with Louise Zemaitis and Michael O'Brien; $2,195 in double occupancy from Philadelphia. Limit 14.
Visit two of the country's most famous venues for witnessing bird migration, where abundant raptors and landbirds provide great learning opportunities during the peak of the season. Migration is weather dependent, but always interesting and potentially amazing. Autumn on the East Coast features great weather and terrific birding. This trip visits some of North America's most famous birding hot spots during the peak of fall migration. Louise and Michael are longtime residents of Cape May and know these areas intimately.
Mexico: Barranca del Cobre, October 10-18, 2009 with Brian Gibbons and Brennan Mulrooney; $2,645 in double occupancy from Los Mochis. Limit 14.
Mexico's famed Barranca del Cobre (Copper Canyon) is compared by many to our Grand Canyon. The comparison doesn't do justice to the astounding variety of habitats offered by this canyon system carved out of the western edge of the Sierra Madre Occidental. This trip offers a wonderful combination of great birding, magnificent scenery, and cultural diversity. VENT's tour to the Copper Canyon is more than a birding tour. It's an adventure across northwestern Mexico.
The following tours to Panama will be led by Barry Zimmer and a local leader. Each tour utilizes a superb lodge as a base, and each offers marvelous birding. Please contact Erik Lindqvist at our office, erik@ventbird.com, 512-328-5221 or 800-328-8368, if you have questions about these tours or wish to register. Additionally, a DVD on central Panama that features these lodges is available from the VENT office free of charge upon request.
Fall at Panama's Canopy Tower, October 17-24, 2009; $2,795 in double occupancy from Panama City. Limit 14.
Central Panama offers a superior combination of tropical forest habitats, fine accommodations, the historic Panama Canal, and superb birding. In only a week you'll encounter 300 species of birds with representatives from many tropical families including hummingbirds, trogons, toucans, woodpeckers, antbirds, cotingas, tanagers, and more. Mid-October is an outstanding time to visit the Canopy Tower and experience the thrill of hawk migration, when thousands of Swainson's Hawks and other species fill the skies over Panama on their journeys south. An excellent list of tropical mammals is also typical of our tours here, with sloths; howler, capuchin, and tamarin monkeys;capybara; kinkajou; and lesser anteater possible.
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Crimson-backed Tanager— Photo: David Tipling/Canopy Tower |
Panama: Fall at El Valle's Canopy Lodge Extension, October 24-29, 2009; $1,595 in double occupancy from Panama City. Limit 14.
This short extension to the Canopy Lodge at El Valle is an excellent complement to the Canopy Tower tour. Unlike the Canal Zone, El Valle sits at a higher elevation, where cooler temperatures and a very different birdlife prevail. Walking through the lush gardens on the lodge grounds is an enchanting experience, where scores of hummingbirds, motmots, toucans, thrushes, honeycreepers, and tanagers are easily found. Excellent accommodations and cuisine and close access to other birding areas make any trip to El Valle a delightful experience.
Panama: Fall at El Valle's Canopy Lodge, November 7-14, 2009; $2,395 in double occupancy from Panama City. Limit 14.
Whereas our other tours to El Valle's Canopy Lodge operate as short extensions to our Canopy Tower tours, this trip offers a full week here. In addition to visiting the same places and searching for the same birds as on the extension, you will travel further afield in search of other specialty birds of western Panama. The lodge, with its wonderful gardens, excellent accommodations, and fine cuisine, offers a superior location from which all activities are based.
Brazil: Emas National Park, October 29-November 8, 2009 with Andrew Whittaker; $2,595 in double occupancy from Brasilia. Limit 8.
Emas presents a vivid landscape of golden grasslands dotted with red termite mounds, and dissected by narrow green ribbons of gallery forest that follow the many clear, rushing streams. This short tour to one of the finest preserved examples of campo/cerrado habitats in central Brazil focuses on birds and mammals of savanna and gallery forest habitats. Participants should expect easy birding with excellent chances for Cone-billed Tanager, White-winged Nightjar, Yellow-faced Parrot, Giant Snipe, Cock-tailed Tyrant, and an array of fancy migrant seedeaters. Wildlife sightings are enhanced by excellent mammal viewing opportunities, with good chances for maned wolf, giant anteater, Brazilian tapir, white-lipped peccary, and others.
Madagascar, October 29-November 18, 2009 with David Bishop and a local leader; $10,695 in double occupancy from Antananarivo. Limit 12. Because two people who were registered for this tour canceled under penalty, we can offer these two spaces at a discount of $2,000 per person.
Unique is the adjective most often used to describe Madagascar. This extraordinary and notably massive island hosts an exceptionally high degree of endemism not only among its birds, but also its plants, trees, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, and insects. Much of this wildlife is remarkably tame, approachable, and visible; as a consequence, this tour represents a truly superb natural history experience. The lemurs are undoubtedly the most famous of Madagascar's wildlife. These "primitive primates" range in size from the tiny mouse lemurs (at 7 inches in length, the smallest) to the child-sized and very vocal indri. These attractive and appealing animals are found throughout Madagascar's forests and woodlands. Of the birds, six entire families are endemic to the Madagascar region: the mesites, ground-rollers, cuckoo-rollers, asities, Madagascar warblers, and vangas. An endemic subfamily of large cuckoos, the couas, also forms an important part of the avifauna. Our tour is designed to visit a wide range of Madagascar's habitats, with enough time in each to seek out the special endemic birds, lemurs, tenrecs, chameleons, and other weird and wonderful creatures.
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Polar Bears— Photo: Doug Hanna |
Polar Bears of Churchill, November 2-8, 2009 with Steve Hilty; $3,295 in double occupancy from Winnipeg. Limit 18. 4 spaces available.
For almost 30 years VENT has been taking people to the shores of Hudson Bay in Churchill, Manitoba to witness one of nature's greatest spectacles: the greatest seasonal concentration of polar bears in the world along southwest Hudson Bay in anticipation of the coming winter. For several weeks each fall there are more polar bears in the Churchill area than in any other place in the world. This tour will spend four days in Churchill, three aboard Tundra Buggies in the Hudson Bay coastline area, where you will see numbers of these magnificent creatures including mothers with cubs, enormous males (often some play-fighting), and enjoy very close views from the Tundra Buggy. The number of bird species we see is small, but the species that remain are spectacular and often include such specialties as Gyrfalcon, Snowy Owl, and Willow Ptarmigan, as well as Snow Buntings, Common Eiders, and Purple Sandpipers.
Highlights of Brazil's Atlantic Forest, November 6-15, 2009 with Kevin Zimmer and Andrew Whittaker; $2,595 in double occupancy from Sao Paolo. Limit 14.
Brazil's Atlantic Forest region boasts more endemic species of birds than any other single region in South America. From stunningly beautiful hummingbirds and tanagers to skulking antbirds and a challenging array of flycatchers, the Atlantic Forest has it all. To see all or nearly all of the endemics takes time and a fair bit of moving around, and that is the domain of our perennially popular Southeast Brazil Tours (Parts I and II). This tour is designed for those desiring a shorter trip that maximizes birding time, minimizes travel time, and still delivers an impressive diversity of Atlantic Forest endemics at a reasonable pace.
TOUR REPORTS
Reports from our tours are posted on the VENT website, www.ventbird.com. They are all interesting, informative, and an excellent way to find out what is happening on VENT tours operating all over the world. Here are some tour reports I thought you might find interesting.
Bhutan, April 6-May 1, 2009 – David Bishop
This was VENT's 21st tour to Bhutan since 1994 when we first began operating in this magical kingdom. So what is it that makes this particular tour so attractive? Quite simply, Bhutan is in a class of its own. Yes, it's an expensive tour, largely because the Bhutanese have decided (in my opinion quite rightly) that they would rather not compromise their culture and spectacular natural environment to hundreds of thousands of tourists, and, consequently, they charge a princely sum for being among the privileged few to visit their country. Similarly we feel that we have a very special product to offer, and while we could make it shorter and thus less expensive, we feel that that would diminish the experience. By taking more time in Bhutan we can literally take the opportunity to "smell the roses," or rather the daphnia, and imbibe the various serendipitous cultural opportunities that offer themselves, as well as really enjoy the birds, mammals, butterflies, and flowering plants that are so profuse in spring in the eastern Himalayas.
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Bhutan— Photo: K. David Bishop |
Bhutan was literally everything we had hoped it would be and more. And it just gets better and better. Our ground agent, Gangri Tours and Travel, treated us like royalty and was absolutely professional, sometimes to the point of this leader's amazement. On our tour we typically record well in excess of 400 species of birds and 15–25 species of mammals.
The summary of our daily activities includes some of the trip's highlights together with a list of what we heard and saw. Nevertheless it only conveys part of the story, and can never really express the wonderful sights and sounds of Bhutan, its land, its forests, its wildlife, and its people. I doubt any of us will ever forget the White-bellied Heron that we watched for 30 minutes or more as he gulped down a gigantic fish; the pair of aptly named Beautiful Nuthatches that we enjoyed on two consecutive days; that gorgeous orange apparition on a tree at eye level alongside our bus one night near our Yongkola Camp—one of, if not THE world's largest flying squirrel; and the fine views of a flock of very infrequently encountered Lesser Rufous-headed Parrotbills and lovely White-hooded Babblers. Of course the birding is always great in Bhutan, and any time you find a Ward's Trogon as well as we did is very special. But, as seems to be a recurring theme on VENT's Asia tours, it was a very good trip for mammals with a total of 20 species seen, including many golden langurs (some at very close range), looks at the goat-like antelope goral, and spectacular views of the gigantic Hodgson's flying-squirrel.
Our next Bhutan tour will operate April 9-May 4, 2010 with Dion Hobcroft; $13,795 in double occupancy from Delhi. Limit 8. 4 spaces available.
Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, May 23-June 6, 2009 – Peter Roberts
This was VENT's first venture exploring this fascinating and remote part of our world—the heart of Central Asia in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Kazakhstan is a huge country—the 9th largest in the world. Everything here is on a vast scale and the great variety of habitats is awesome. Huge expanses of subtly differing flat steppe grasslands merging into sandy and stony deserts, dotted here and there with saline and freshwater lakes and marshes, make a superb visual impact. Traveling for hours through such remarkable landscapes gave us a real sense of the enormous size of this seldom-visited heartland of Asia. In total contrast to the flat expanses of steppe were the towering snow-capped peaks and flower-rich alpine meadows of the Tien Shan Mountains. We traveled above the snowline to over 10,000 feet in this colossal mountain range—peak after peak, ridge after ridge extending for hundreds of miles.
We recorded 260 species of birds during our trip—an extremely good result—finding most of everything on our "wish lists," plus a lot more that was less expected. Our list of really great birds seen included McQueen's Bustard, Sociable Lapwing, Pallid Harrier, and Black, Bimaculated, and White-winged larks displaying far out on the endless steppe grasslands. Lakes and marshes held Dalmatian Pelicans; White-headed Ducks; superb colonies of Great Black-headed Gulls; Black-winged Pratincoles; Demoiselle Cranes; White-winged Terns; Paddyfield, Blyth's Reed, and Booted warblers; Azure Tits; and Black-headed and White-crowned penduline-tits. The more truly desert-like habitats cut through by mighty rivers in rocky gorges hosted Himalayan Griffon; sandgrouse; Sykes's and Asian Desert warblers; Pale-backed Pigeon; White-winged Woodpecker; Pallid Scops-Owl; Saxaul Sparrow; Pied, Desert, and Isabelline wheatears; Desert Finch; Gray-hooded, Red-headed, Meadow, and Chestnut-breasted buntings; Rosy Starling; Turkestan Tit; and Pale Sand Martin.
The magnificent Tien Shan Mountains were a staggering backdrop to such sought-after, attractive, and enigmatic birds as Ibisbill; Himalayan Snowcock; Brown Dipper; Black-throated and Himalayan accentors; Blue Whistling-Thrush; White-tailed Rubythroat; White-winged, Blue-headed, and Rufous-backed redstarts; White-browed Tit-Warbler; Songar Tit; Fire-fronted Serin; Plain Mountain-Finch; White-winged Grosbeak; Red-mantled Rosefinch; and Sulphur-bellied, Hume's, and Greenish warblers.
Uzbekistan is a country famous for its ancient historical sites along the Silk Road at fabled Tashkent, Samarkand, and Bukhara. The stunning architecture and intricate adornments of mosques, minarets, and medrassahs are world-class, inspirational, and jaw-droppingly beautiful. We deliberately left this spectacle until last so that we had the bulk of the wonderful birding behind us, allowing us to concentrate and finish on this phenomenal cultural "high"! However, Uzbekistan had its own very special last ornithological thrills in store: White-tailed Lapwing, Lammergeier, Persian Nuthatch, Hume's Lark, Rufous-tailed Scrub-Robin, White-throated Robin, Finsch's and Variable wheatears, Eastern Orphean Warbler, Asian Paradise-Flycatcher, Yellow-breasted Tit, and of course, the remarkable "roadrunner" of Central Asia—Turkestan Ground-Jay, out in the parched expanses of the Kyzyl-Kum Desert.
I think all participants were pleased with what they found. Far from backward, hostile countries that some may have anticipated, there were excellent hotels, a good infrastructure, decent food, friendly people, and incredibly helpful and competent ground agents and expert local guides personified in Victoria Kovshar, who guided us so effectively and with such good humor to just about every bird we desired in Kazakhstan.
Our next Kazakhstan tour will operate May 12-26, 2011 with David Bishop and a local leader; tour fee to be announced in double occupancy from Astana, Kazakhstan. Our next Uzbekistan extension will operate May 26-June 1, 2011 with David Bishop and a local leader; tour fee to be announced in double occupancy from Tashkent, Uzbekistan.
Northern Peru, July 6-20, 2009 – Steve Hilty
I enjoy all the trips I lead, but a few trips do make a little bigger impression than others, and this is one of those. This trip stands out in numerous ways—certainly for the Marvelous Spatuletail and White-winged Guan, two among a remarkable number of endemic and marquee species. This trip also stands out for the large number of birds with unresolved taxonomic issues, which are a reflection of stark habitat differences over short geographical distances and a lack of ornithological work here. Also making this trip notable are the great variety of habitats and elevations explored along this route; some interesting cultural sidelights involving the history of early Peruvian civilizations; and finally, that sense of adventure that always seems to accompany trips into remote areas that are beyond usual tourist routes.
We explored habitats ranging from deserts, tropical thorn and scrub forests to cloud forest, montane dwarf forest, and treeline Andean grasslands, and encountered a spectacular array of birds—endemics, near-endemics, rare species, and ones such as the Marvelous Spatuletail—that are so fanciful they have to be seen to be believed. This was, in fact, a fabulous trip for hummingbirds—along with northwestern Ecuador, one of the best anywhere. We recorded 40 species of hummers, with the majority being seen at feeders (three locations) where they could be seen to advantage again and again, rather than glimpsed in the field. Among them were, of course, the spatuletail (repeated views at two sites), Sword-billed Hummingbird, Rainbow Starfrontlet, Purple-throated Sunangel, Little Woodstar, and more. This was also an excellent trip for small owls, with 6 species seen including the rare Cinnamon Screech-Owl and Koepcke's Screech-Owl. Last of all, this is an excellent trip for tanagers with nearly 40 species in some of the most colorful associations imaginable at small fruiting trees.
At the end of the trip I solicited a list of favorite sightings or events from the group. It is perhaps significant that, aside from near unanimous mention of the Marvelous Spatuletail, the lists were remarkably different, suggesting that there is such a diversity of birds and experiences on this trip that people chose widely from the possibilities. Top listings were Black-and-chestnut Eagle (perched close), Sword-billed Hummingbird, Gray-breasted Mountain-Toucan, Scaled Fruiteater, Rufous-winged Tyrant (unique hovering behavior when foraging), Black-crested Tit-Tyrant (very cute!), and Moustached Flowerpiercer. Best events included a tree full of tanagers (13 species) at dawn, and seeing three Peruvian endemics in the same small tree (Gray-winged Inca-Finch, Buff-bellied Tanager, and Chestnut-backed Thornbird); it is noteworthy that Marañón Gnatcatcher and Black-lored Yellowthroat, both represented by endemic subspecies, were perched near that same tree.
Our next Northern Peru tour will operate October 15-30, 2010 with Steve Hilty; tour fee to be announced in double occupancy from Lima, Peru.
FINAL THOUGHTS
After one of the hottest and driest summers in the history of central Texas, I am looking forward to cooler temperatures, hopefully more rain, and fall bird migration! Even though it is less renowned than spring migration, the fall migration period is also a marvelous phenomenon involving the movement of millions of birds across our continent.
Our Autumn Grand Manan, Washington: September Migration in the Pacific Northwest, West Texas: Cibolo Creek Lodge, and Cape May, Hawk Mountain & Bombay Hook tours all offer excellent opportunities to enjoy fall migration.
Best wishes,
Victor Emanuel