This morning, a friend and I drove up to Fort DeSoto.  We left about 7:00 and arrived at the Tierre Verde ponds around 8:30.  We stooped at the second pond.  Workers were present building a sidewalk along the road.  There were quite a few ducks and other water fowl present.  We observed Coots, Moorhens, Pied-billed Grebes, Ring-necked Ducks, Lesser Scaup, a few Redheads, and a single male Canvasback.  We obtained some fairly good images of the Canvasback.

We then drove to Fort De Soto, starting at the eastern turnaround.  The tide was extremely low and very few birds were seen close to the shore.  Hundreds of wading birds and shorebirds could be seen in the distance on exposed sandbars.  We then went to the North Beach area.  Again, there were very few birds in the area.  However, there was a small flock of White Pelicans (7), a few Western Sandpipers, Sanderlings, Willets, Black-bellied and Semipalmated Plovers, Gulls (Herring, Laughing, and Ring-billed), four Red-breasted Mergansers, and some Herons (Little Blue and Tricolored).  We made a final stop at the Mulberry bush area.  The only birds seen there were Palm and Yellow-rumped Warblers and an Osprey. 

I signed up for a birding trip to Costa Rica, led by Jim Stevenson of Galveston TX (www.galvestonbirders.org).  I flew to San Jose on Sunday, Feb 17^th.  The group members, seven plus Jim, stayed at the AeroPuerto hotel, which is located about 10 minutes from the airport.  We all met at 6:00 am on Monday morning and took off in the Toyota Microbus Jim had rented.  Jim has been going to Costa Rica for more than 15 years and was quite familiar with the roads and places to bird.  We spent all of all time in the northern and north eastern parts of Costa Rica.  We tallied 260 species of birds during the trip.

One of the days was spent on a boat with guide cruising the Rio Frio River by Los Chiles (close to the Nicaragua border).  This was a very productive day with good weather.  In addition to birds, we saw several species of monkeys and reptiles. 

One day we walked on a road that went through some marshy areas and a prairie.  We saw quite a diversity of birds, including Nicaraguan Seed-Finches, Groove-billed Anis, a Gray-breasted Crake, two Ruddy Crakes, Jacanas, Common Tody-Flycatchers, and a Roadside Hawk.  The Lodge we stayed at that evening had a few feeders that attracted some nice birds, including Aracari, Brown-headed Parrots, and Keel-billed Toucans.  We also saw a Bat Falcon nearby.