Three Counties Wildlife: Resplendent Quetzals...and venomous vipers.

Thursday 25 July 2019

Resplendent Quetzals...and venomous vipers.

We had to start early for Quetzals - coffee in the restaurant at 4:45 and in the van shortly afterwards. We didn't have to travel far but timing was essential. They come out to feed on avocados for a couple of hours before disappearing into the cloud forest for the rest of the day and we didn't want to miss them!

Twenty minutes later and we are standing in a long strip of pasture with a stream running through the middle of it staring at a male Resplendent Quetzal sitting in the branches of an avocado tree, what an amazing sight it was too.

Resplendent Quetzal, male
Females are similar but lack the long
upper tail coverts (yep, the tail is the white bit)

Resplendent Quetzal, male

After spending a couple of hours with these incredible birds, we went back to the Lodge for a quick breakfast before spending the rest of the morning finishing some filming up on the Paramo. By lunchtime we were ready to move on to visit Paraiso Quetzal Lodge to see a special local resident, a Montane Pitviper Cerrophidion sasai.

The Montane Pitviper is found along the length of the Talamanca Highlands and, like most pitvipers, is a 'sit-n-wait' ambush predator. It will sit on logs, path edges, under vegetation - anywhere where its prey (frogs, lizards, other snakes and small mammals) might scoot by on their day-today travels. It's known to have quite a strong haemotoxic venom. In colour and pattern (and it's ability to function at higher,cooler altitudes) it was not dissimilar in appearance to our European Adder (Vipera berus). This one was about to slough.