In the interest of fairness, I should say that it is currently sunny, and that from where I am sitting, I can see howler monkeys, spider monkeys and white-face monkeys, as well as about 50 of the 850 or so species of birds that twitchers come all this way to see. But it has been Very Wet. My clothes are damp, and my books are mouldy, and I am thinking wistfully about the British heatwave.
Spider monkey in the Osa, demonstrating good use of tail.
The macaw turf war seems to be over. Actually, maybe it wasn’t a turf war – maybe it was a series of aerial soirees, raucous coming out balls for macaw debutantes. Anyway, the season’s over and the flock of thirteen that spent its days flying up and down this beach during January has broken up. Now it’s mainly a pair and a trio that feast on these almond trees – I’ve just heard squawking and looked up to see two pairs and the trio, so who knows. Macaws mate for life and are generally in twos, so I’m curious to know more about the spare macaw. Is it a widow or widower the others take pity on? An offspring that won’t leave the nest? Are they having a ménage a trois? The groups come together in a tall palm beside the track up to the hotel, and then head for their preferred trees, one of which is the beach almond in front of the house.
Actually I should have called this pecking order. Their social hierarchy is clear. The flashiest of them all, the scarlet-rumped tanager, is lowest of the low; the flycatcher (yellow, don’t know what sort, will ask a guide) that is not afraid to buzz me or Carmen as we pass under any frond it happens to be perched on, is terrified by the orange-chested bird, which I think is the female tanager (poor Mr Tanager). All day long this bit of this palm is occupied; occasionally all three are sitting there, in a spirit of uneasy mutual toleration.
This afternoon it got dark, and, a few minutes after I had set off home in flip flops, carrying my heavy bags, water was released at full force from the 100 square km showerhead suspended over Corcovado. The sea went greenish and frothy. That night phosphorescence lit the breakers from beneath creating 500-metre rollers of neon white – as bright as a search light – that lumbered up and smashed in a brilliant neon spray at the rocks in front of the house and against the wall of the bat cave at the end of the beach.
Excerpt from a video interview with Dan Phillips, founder of the Phoenix Commotion at the Bone House, Huntsville Texas. I’ve posted an intro to Dan’s work here.
Somewheresville 