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ECUADOR -- Southeast
17 - 23
November 2007
by Martin Reid
From November 17 – 23 2007 three of us plus a
local driver Mauricio (who is becoming a good birder
and is very good at finding birds) visited a few spots, mostly in
southeastern Ecuador. The weather
became a major factor, as it was unusually rainy and wet – it rained
every day, and on most days there
was some torrential rain. As a result we lost perhaps a fifth or more
of our possible birding time, some
trails were much wetter/more difficult than expected, and most
afternoons were rather dead for birds,
even when the rain had abated.
Despite this, we managed to find some of the
rarer species, and as some of the locations we visited are
not covered very well in recent birding reports, I thought I’d provide
a personal summary that may
help others thinking of visiting these places.
Our Itinerary:
Nov 17: left Guayaquil airport at 1:00am and
drove to Saraguro via Cuenca, arriving there just after
dawn. Birded Huasapamba and Anacama (= Incapirca) for most of the day,
then drove to Loja for the
night.
Nov 18: left before dawn for drive to Cabanas
Yankuam. Stopped to bird along lower part of Old
Loja Road (near La Fragrencia, a few kms before Zamora) for a couple of
hours soon after dawn, then
drove via Zamora and Zumbi to Paquisha on the Rio Nangaritza. Birded
the Paquisha road (up into
the Cordillera del Condor) for a couple of hours in the afternoon then
returned to the fork 3kms west
of the bridge in Paquisha, where the signs point to the south for
Cabanas Yankuam (CY). Drove to
CY, with a few birding stops on the way, arriving just before the light
started to dim at c. 5:15pm.
Nov 19: left lodge at 7am (an hour late;
staff had overslept) for spectacular boat ride upstream to the
Shuar village at Shaime (took just under an hour). Walked the “cutover”
route to the oilbird cave, and
returned via a forested loop that rejoined our original trail. This
took all day, partly due to very
difficult trail conditions. Boat back to CY took 40 minutes, arriving
just before dark at c. 5:45pm.
Nov 20: birded on the CY grounds and along
the entrance road all day, with lunch at the lodge.
Nov 21: left before dawn and drove back to
Paquisha (1hr 45 mins from lodge), then up the Paquisha
road as far as we could, then birded up and down the upper, partly
forested, part of this road for most
of the day, losing a few afternoon hours to heavy rain. Back to CY for
the night.
Nov 22: left CY just before 6am (delayed
again by oversleeping staff) for drive to Copalinga. Constant rain
persuaded us to head straight to Zamora rather than attempt more
birding on the
Paquisha road. From c. 10am until c. 3:30pm spent at Copalinga and
along the road between there and
the entrance to Podocarpus NP., then drove to Loja for night in
constant rain.
Nov 23: pre-dawn drive to Catacocha, and
thence a few kms south to the San Antonio turning. A rare
rainless morning in the dry scrub forest, then the long drive to Puerto
Pitahaya near Santa Rosa (with
more rain), with a final stop along the highway at Manglares Churute
before it got dark. Evening
arrival at Guayaquil airport for flight home.
Sites:
Zumbi:
This pleasant small town east of Zamora is
the gateway to the southeast sites. In the town square
during the rain I found a male White-chested
Swift fairly low among some Chestnut-collared swifts
and Chaeturas About 3 kms east of the square on the road to Paquisha
you pass through a largely
deforested fairly broad valley with decent foothill forest cresting the
distant hills to the north. We
stopped to ‘scope a Laughing Flacon here, and to our surprise and
delight found an adult Black-and-white
Hawk-Eagle soaring around to the north for quite some time,
occasionally drifting in with some
Swallow-tailed Kites. We were all able to enjoy ‘scope looks and soak
in the details.
Paquisha:
I can’t find any reference to birding east of
this town in any of the various reports – but it might be
known by a different name - ? The road from Zumbi heads southeast for
almost an hour, when you
then arrive at a fork. There is a large sign indicating that Cabanas
Yankuam is 46kms down the right
fork (actually it was 50 kms on our odometer), with nothing signed for
straight-ahead (= left fork). Going straight ahead you arrive – after
about 3 kms – at the bridge over the Rio Nangaritza, and on the
far side the small town of Paquisha. All distances mentioned below are
from this bridge. Drive
straight ahead through the middle of the town (there is a small
hosteria on the left as you get to the
middle; it was closed but a lady at the next-door tienda said that the
owner would come and open it for
guests) until you get to a small roundabout/traffic island with a
statue of an indigenous person in the
middle.
Again go straight ahead, and you embark on a road the winds up
for more than 13 kms into
the upper foothills. The first 9 kms is largely cut-over, but even
small patches of forest here were
birdy on our first afternoon visit. The better forest patches start
after 9kms or so, with some very nice
ones after c. 11kms. Eventually (a bit more than 13kms) the road peters
out by becoming heavily
overgrown with tall grass and no surfacing. At this point an obvious
foot trail continues up hill on the
left. Our driver ran up there a way and said there seemed to be lots
more good forest. We birded our
way back downhill along the road. I estimate from using various maps on
the internet that the end of
the drivable road is at c. 1450 meters elevation, while the Paquisha
bridge is c, 820 meters. We birded
back and forth along uppermost 3kms of the road for one morning, and a
bit of the mainly-rained-out
afternoon.
Less than 100 yards from the end of the road there is a
stand of very tall trees on both sides
of the road, and here we saw a pair of Scarlet-breasted
Fruiteaters, a Black-streaked
Puffbird, and
possibly a pair of Blackish Pewees
(in the field the size and call seemed right, as did the behaviour,
but my poor pics look a bit more like Smoke-colored Pewee). In one of
the better small patches of
forest and second-growth a bit lower down (7 – 9 kms from the bridge)
we had a good mixed flock
that contained Ecuadorian Tyrannulet
and a singing Spectacled
Bristle-Tyrant, while overhead the
light rain pushed down a number of swifts among which were Pale-rumped Swifts flying with
Gray-rumped Swifts for a useful comparison. In the first patch of good
forest (c. 10kms from the bridge)
we came across a large mixed flock feeding in the middle and upper
levels close overhead; this
produced female Cerulean Warbler, Rufous-rumped
Tyrannulet and a long-studied male Plain-winged Antwren.
Just above
this spot there is a lone small house on the left – the last dwelling
on the
roadside. 1.3kms up-road from this house a small quedabra runs under
the road from the right side,
and just yards above this point there are two trails into the forest,
one on either side. We only
explored a very short section of the one on the right, which goes
uphill through lovely forest; our
driver scampered along the one on the left (which initially goes up
through a small regenerating patch)
and he told us the trail quickly descends through more good forest. We
did not see the trails at first
because the first time we stopped at this spot in the mid-morning a
huge mixed-species flock
comprising mostly of Tangara tanagers (primarily Blue-necked,
including a couple of funky
immatures) was swarming around in the fruiting trees above us.
I think
we probably missed some
good birds in this flock because soon after we started working it we
found a pair of Straw-colored
Tanagers – but not all of us saw them, so it was a bit frantic
as we concentrated on relocating these
birds. Eventually the flock moved off downhill, but two hours later we
tried there again, and found at
least part of the flock having a siesta at the top of one of the taller
trees. It was interesting as we saw
some of them arrive in the tree, preen for a couple of minutes, then
shuffle in under the dense leaf
cover and completely disappear, leaving no trace of their presence. I
might have glimpsed a
Spectacled Prickletail in that
flock, but could not confirm it.
The upper part of the road plus the two
trails by the quedabra have the potential to produce quite a few
rare/restricted species found in the 1300 – 1400m elevational range.
Based on comments made by a
local woman we met on the upper part of the road, the main trail at the
end of the road continues for
many kilometers, and probably climbs much higher, providing access to
some of the specialties found
above 1700m. Note that the latest issue of the “Guia VIAL del Ecuador”
map shows that this road
continues almost to the Peruvian border. Perhaps it is in the works to
extend this road, as that woman
we met thought that were engineers, there to work on extending the road.
Cabanas
Yankuam:
There is a web site from which you can
contact them.
Getting there:- here are
the directions supplied by the lodge (with some of my comments
embedded):
Coming from
Quito/Cuenca to Loja, at the Terminal Terrestre take left at the
traffic roundabout to
Zamora. Loja – Zamora 1h30min (it can take longer if the upper
section is socked-in by clouds, as on
our descent).
Coming to Zamora,
continue straight on, the Terminal Terrestre will be on left hand side,
straight on
at two roundabouts, pass the bridge over river Zamora, turn right at
the T-cross, Avenida del Ejercito,
straight on. (the last proper gas station is on the eastern
outskirts of Zamora, so be sure to fill up; you
can buy a small amount of gas at Cabanas Yankuam).
Follow the main road
until you get to the hanging Saquea bridge, cross that bridge, after
the bridge
take right, sign Yantzaza. (this hanging bridge is beyond
Cumbaratza).
Before Yantzaza,
there is a village Zumbi where you leave the main road turning right at
the
roundabout and cross the bridge over river Zamora.
Zamora-Zumbi 40min
Entering Zumbi, turn
right so that you have the city park on your left hand side. Turn left
so that you
still have the park on your left hand side. Continue straight on
slightly uphill, the gravel road to
Guayzimi begins. (the road actually then turns back left again,
roughly joining up with the road on
which you entered the village; the first small restaurant on the right
after you turn right at the city
park makes a nice, inexpensive packed lunch – and it was from there
that I saw a White-chested Swift
among other Cypseloides and Chaetura.)
After about 30-40min
from Zumbi there is a Y-cross with a sign Cabañas Yankuam 46 km and
Guayzimi 26 km, take right. (NOTE important – this is not the fork
shown on maps that is soon after
Zumbi; the actual fork is very close to the Rio Nangaritza, and is only
shown on the very latest maps).
Zumbi-Guayzimi 1h15min
Coming to Guayzimi
take right so that you follow the sign “vehiculos pesados” (this
route then turns
back to the left, effectively bypassing the main part of the town but
continuing south).
Leave Guayzimi for
the next village Zurmi
Guayzimi - Zurmi 30min
Coming to Zurmi
continue straight on for the next village Orquídeas Zurmi-Orquídeas 1h.
The river Nangaritza
is visible on the left hand side.
Pass the village
Orquídeas and continue straight on 3 km with the river on your left
hand side. Where
the road ends you find the Cabañas Yankuam. Welcome! (Orquideas is
tiny and you pass through the
middle of it, right next to the river; this is the last place to buy
stuff at a tienda, and note that while the
lodge serves beer and wine, they do not currently offer any soft
drinks/cokes – we bought our own and
put it in their fridge). Note that we clocked the distance from the
main fork as 50kms to the lodge –
their sign says 46kms.
The route from Zumbi to
the lodge is mostly through cut-over land, with some small,
nice-looking
forest tracts set back from the road on steep slopes and in ravines.
After taking the right fork to the
lodge the first c.15 kms goes through a handful of stream gullies that
have some forest (and birds), but
otherwise there is very little natural habitat until you get beyond
Orquideas. From the lodge the road
continues only about half a kilometer to a (disused?) vehicle ferry. A
trail of sorts continues along the river bank, but appeared to peter
out after a short distance.
We found the section between the ferry
and the stream just south of the lodge to be very birdy (a close,
calling Red-billed Tyrannulet,
Rusty-fronted and Golden-winged Tody-Flycatchers, Swainson’s and Euler’s Flycatchers, a pair
of Stripe-chested Antwrens, Purplish
Jacamar; many swifts along the river at dawn (going
upstream) and dusk (going downstream), including at least one White-chested Swift), as was the
first
kilometer north of the lodge (Blue-crowned
Trogon, Stripe-chested Antwren, Chestnut-crowned
Becard, Black-faced and Yellow-bellied Dacnis, Paradise,
Green-and-Gold, Turquoise, and
Masked Tanagers). Directly
opposite the parking for the lodge there is a trailhead going inside
the
forest and uphill. We only went a short way up this trail, but it looks
to offer great birding inside
excellent forest (we saw White-browed
and Blackish Antbirds, Golden-winged
Tody-Flycatcher,
and a territorial male Black-throated
Brilliant). The owners told me that the lodge is at 930 meters
elevation, but Google Earth seems to show it as a bit less than 900
meters.
There are currently two
large separate buildings close to the main building (dining area), each
with
two storeys comprising one roomy cabin with private bathroom (no hot
water) on each level. Light
sleepers might want to be in the upper cabin – from the lower cabin you
can hear every movement of
those above you. In addition there is a larger building next to (left)
the dining room that has bedrooms
with shared facilities. The meals were very good, and we especially
liked the box lunches. There are
two hummingbird feeders one the edge of the dining area balcony, plus
one tucked under a bush a few
yards into the garden.
There was not a huge amount of activity at the
feeders during our four-day
visit, and all the hummers were rather timid – only feeding if everyone
in the dining area were very
still. With patience (and no other people at the dining area) I was
able to get some good photos of
Grey-breasted Sabrewing at the
balcony feeders just before dusk. The only other species we saw
visit the feeders (all rather briefly) were Glittering-throated Emerald (the
commonest species) and
Great-billed and Gray-chinned Hermits.
From the dining area we saw Cuvier’s
and White-throated Toucans, Amazonian
Umbrellabird (each morning just after dawn a female perched for
a
short while on a bare forked snag located to the right of the dining
room – only visible from below the
balcony), Crimson-crested Woodpecker,
Greater Yellow-headed Vulture, and numerous
commoner species.
We did not attempt the Tepui
Trail, but I discussed it with the owner, who told me
that it ascends
about 600 meters to a campground (or third parcela), and is very steep
in places, requiring you to
climb short sections using roots and vines. The Royal Sunangel, Roraiman Flycatcher
and Bar-winged Wood-Wren are
found before the campground.
The
Orange-throated Tanager trip:
From CY this requires a c.
one-hour trip upriver by boat (40
mins back, with the current); it goes through some spectacular forested
gorges, but we saw very little
in the way of birdlife. You arrive at the Shuar village of Shaime, walk
through the village and on to
the Oilbird Cave trail. Don’t expect to see a Nat Geo-type indigenous
village and people; the
buildings are a mixture of old and modern, and most of the people I saw
were wearing western-style
clothes. The villagers largely ignored us, but a few schoolkids in
uniforms we walked past tried out
their English on us. I can’t tell you if our experience on the trail
was typical, as it has rained hard for
six days, plus one of our party had vertigo and balance issues that
required us to travel very slowly on
steep sections and stream crossings. We were supposed to pick up a
Shuar guide but apparently he
was visiting Zamora. Thus our only guide was Hermes, who worked at
Yankuam cooking meals and
driving the boat.
Hermes is not a bird guide, but he has been on this
trail many times and knew where
to find the tanagers, and he knew their vocalizations. The lodge will
provide Wellington boots, but
they only go up to c. a men’s size 11. Boots are essential unless you
are prepared to wear something
that you are willing to get completely soaked and caked in mud. There
are about 4 or 5 stream
crossings to make, and on one of these, the water went over the top of
our boots. Some crossings
require using rather flimsy log bridges (but I made it and I weigh 240+
lbs!) Long sections of the trail
were extremely muddy – at one point I got really stuck and nearly left
a boot behind. We estimated
that it was c. 5 kms to get to the Oilbird cave via the “short” route,
and more than 6kms back via the
”loop” route. Most of the first 3 - 4 kms is through a mixture of
second-growth, pastures, and
scattered trees.
We did not see many birds, due to a combination of
rain and having to concentrate on
not falling, slipping, or sinking on the trail. The trail goes up and
down many times, so that the net
gain in elevation is not great. The last c.1.5 kms goes through larger
tracts of forest, and this is where
most sightings of the Orange-throated Tanager (OTTA) are made. We had
six encounters with them,
but the three of us only saw them on two of these occasions (eagle-eyed
Mauricio saw them at least
four times) All the encounters were of two or three birds very high in
the canopy or subcanopy with
other species, with views mostly being from directly below the birds.
Frankly the looks were not that
great, and I failed miserably to get them in my ‘scope the one time
they offered the best looks (a bit
lower in a fruiting tree).
Given that it was raining most of the time
and we had to look almost directly
up to see them, spectacle-wearers will have a frustrating time (this
applied to all three of us!) All the
locations where we had OTTAs were in tall forest over the trail with
smallish viewing windows –
except for “the clearing”. This spot is a large pasture that has
scattered mature trees, and the trail
climbs up to the top of a small ridge where more forest begins. Hermes
told us that this was a good
place to see them, as visibility was much greater than anywhere else.
We had no luck on the way in,
but then we came out from the Oilbird cave a different route that met
the original route at this same
pasture, and while we had two OTTAs calling and seen flying from one
tree to another, they were
always out of sight when perched. I would say that this would be the
best place for a large group to
get onto these birds, as with better luck you could get them in a
‘scope fairly easily.
At this same
clearing we had a flock of 7 or 8 Spot-winged
Parrotlets land in one of the trees. The oilbird cave is
rather small and drops down from the trail, necessitating a 3+ meter
scramble down steep muddy
rocks (but not dangerous, and easily do-able with care). This places
you on a flat shallow streambed,
where you walk into the cave only a few yards (entrance still visible
and no illumination needed to get
to this point), turn around and look back up to the crevices over the
left side of the entrance hole,
where a spotlight will reveal a handful of Oilbirds. Apparently there are many
more birds further into
the cave, but it’s not necessary to go there in order to get great
looks at these outer ones (but a
spotlight or strong flashlight is essential).
Our second visible
encounter with OTTAs was right above
the entrance to the cave, and this location has a slightly larger field
of view than the other forest spots
where we encountered them. It took us from 8am until 5pm to complete
the round-trip from the
village and back again, with a short lunch stop at the oilbird cave. Plain-backed Antpittas called
enticingly at two spots in small forest patches close to the pastures
we crossed in the first half of the
trail, and had we not been concerned about time, it should have been
possible to divert into the forest
to find them. In the Village there are a number of wet grassy ditches
and swales that probably hold a
number of crakes – we got within 15 feet of a responding Gray-breasted Crake, without seeing
it.
We saw three different Purplish
Jacamars on the trail, but otherwise not much else of note. We
three
all agreed that this was the hardest trail we’d ever done (and we all
have hiked to Boot Springs in Big
Bend NP, Texas many times) – most of the difficulty being the condition
of the trail itself. Even
Mauricio – a Mountain Goat compared to us – said it was a very bad
trail. To be honest, we three
were all quite miserable by the time we got back to the village, and
would not have attempted it had
we known what we were in for…
Martin Reid
upupa@airmail.net