Recent Photos Gallery - March 2019

This splendid flight shot of an Indian Roller by guide Tom Johnson from our Northern India tour launches our March Recent Photos Gallery. We are excited to share photographic highlights from our recent Japan, Brazil, Colombia, Antarctica, Trinidad & Tobago, Cambodia, Canada, Jamaica, Panama, and Guatemala tours!

Brightening the Northern India checklist was this male Orange-bellied Leafbird, by far the most colorful member of its genus (Chloropsis) in India. Photo by guide Tom Johnson.

The most optimistic estimates for the global population of Tigers suggest that fewer than 4,000 individuals are left in the wild. Northern India remains one of the best locations for seeing this endangered apex predator. Photo by guide Tom Johnson.

The elegance of terns in flight, like this Black-bellied, is undeniable. This species is widespread in India and Bangladesh but often difficult to find elsewhere. Photo by guide Tom Johnson.

From out of the shadows emerges a lovely Rufous-chinned Laughingthrush, one of the most ornate of the nearly 30 species of laughingthrushes known from India. Allies of the babblers, nearly all of the species in this family (Leiotrichidae) are furtive and found in dense cover. Photo by guide Tom Johnson.

Guide Tom Johnson found the perfect angle to showcase this Wallcreeper's talents. Found from Spain to eastern China, but nowhere common, Wallcreepers blend perfectly with their rocky habitat---until they unfurl their broad, butterfly-like wings, revealing intense fuchsia and white markings (barely visible here). This bird is of the eastern subspecies (nepalensis).

Still widespread over much of India and Sri Lanka, Plum-headed Parakeet is a gloriously handsome bird when seen well. This species' large population and distribution, like that of its congeners Alexandrine and Rose-ringed parakeets (also seen on the tour), may be attributable to its ability to adapt to human-modified habitats. Photo by guide Tom Johnson.

Endemic to India, Painted Spurfowl (here a striking male) inhabit thorn scrub and bamboo thickets, where the are more often heard than seen, their presence given away by loud cackling calls. Photo by guide Tom Johnson.

We challenge you to look at this image of a Jungle Owlet and not think the word cute. (Impossible!) This species, like the more widespread Spotted Owlet, is often active during the day, even in areas bustling with human activity. Photo by guide Tom Johnson.

The largest and longest-billed of the minivets found in India, Scarlet Minivet is found in the Himalayas and central/eastern parts of the subcontinent. Minivets are now included in the family Campephagidae, with cuckooshrikes, placed after vireos and before the enigmatic Mottled Berryhunter (family Rhagologidae) of New Guinea. Photo by guide Tom Johnson.

Placed in phylogenetic sequence between bee-eaters and barbets, the hornbills, such as this Indian Gray Hornbill, are among the most captivating of birds. Their cavity-nesting habits can make it hard to find one without worn flight feathers! Photo by guide Tom Johnson.

Sloth Bears are endemic to the Indian Subcontinent. These insectivorous bears are named for their long, sickle-shaped claws; their long lower lip and palate are also adaptations to eating terrestrial insects. The species is listed as Vulnerable, primarily because of habitat loss. Photo by guide Tom Johnson.

Participants (and guides!) on the Northern India tour were ecstatic to find this Brown Fish Owl roosting in a tree cavity. Photo by guide Tom Johnson.

We soar into our next set of images from Winter Japan: Cranes & Sea Eagles, led by this White-tailed Eagle. Photo by participant Becky Hansen.

This stunning beast is a Steller's Sea-Eagle, found only in eastern Asia, with a few records from Alaska (and one from Hawaii!). In this species, the larger females can weigh as much as 20 pounds and have an eight-foot wingspan, making this the largest raptor in the world. Photo by participant Becky Hansen.

Love was in the air for these captivating White-naped Cranes. This species breeds mostly in Mongolia, China, and Russia, but there is a record of breeding from Hokkaido, Japan (1985), where our tour found this flock. Photo by participant Becky Hansen.

"Watching Snow Monkeys as fresh flakes fell all around us was magical," wrote one participant. Known also as Japanese Macaque, or simply the local name of "saru," these primates are endemic to Japan and live in matrilineal societies. Photo by participant Becky Hansen.

Red-crowned Cranes are the epitome of elegance and grace, and the Winter Japan tour spends good time with this special bird. This species is resident on Hokkaido, but the populations that breed in northeastern China (and adjacent areas) winter in Korea and around Jiangsu, China. Photo by participant Becky Hansen.

Copper Pheasant is a variable species, with five named subspecies, all endemic to Japan. Although superficially similar in structure to Ring-necked/Green Pheasant (genus Phasianus), also seen on our Japan tour, Copper is placed in genus Syrmaticus, with the glorious Mikado Pheasant (Taiwan) and Elliot's and Reeves's pheasants (China). Photo by guide Phil Gregory.

This Great Spotted Woodpecker stood out beautifully in the snowy landscape. This species includes more than a dozen subspecies; not surprisingly, this bird belongs to the easternmost, japonicus. Photo by participant Becky Hansen.

These dozing Ural Owls, a high point of the Winter Japan tour, were of the very pale subspecies japonica. Photo by participant Becky Hansen.

Seed feeders afforded us excellent views of the sharply plumaged Varied Tit, an east Asian endemic species with at least four subspecies that show (as the name implies) remarkable variation in plumages. Photo by participant Becky Hansen.

Participant Holger Teichmann shared this lovely image of a Gray-breasted Parakeet from our next tour: Nowhere but Northeast Brazil II. Indeed, this species is found nowhere else but in the state of Ceará, where it inhabits inselbergs of the Serra de Baturité and Quixadá. There are past but no recent records from the Serra de Ibiapaba and also from the state of Pernambuco, in the Serra Negra.

This bristly Crescent-chested Puffbird is of the allopatric (isolated) subspecies minor, which has a tiny range in northeastern Brazil. Photo by participant Holger Teichmann.

Another Brazilian endemic with a very limited range is the striking Hooded Visorbearer, found in the campos rupestres, or "rocky fields," an ecoregion of montane savanna in the Atlantic Forest (at 700--2,000m elevations). These hummingbirds feed on nectar of terrestrial bromeliads and cacti. Photo by participant Holger Teichmann.