Today, a particularly colorful pair of visitors was spotted around Central. With bright orange plumage, black-and-white wings, and distinctive dark streaks along their backs, the birds appear to be Streak-backed Orioles (Icterus pustulatus), a species native to the Pacific side of Central America and very much at home in Guanacaste.
Despite looking like rather exotic visitors, Streak-backed Orioles are residents of Costa Rica’s northern Pacific lowlands, where they are commonly associated with tropical dry forest, open woodland, forest edges, gardens, and areas with scattered trees. In other words, the landscape surrounding Town provides exactly the kind of environment where they can thrive.
Their diet may offer another clue as to what this pair was doing around Central. These birds feed on insects and other small invertebrates, but they also enjoy fruit and nectar, often exploring flowers, leaves, and branches in search of their next meal. The planters around Central, where they were first spotted, could therefore provide interesting places for them to forage while remaining closely connected to the surrounding green areas.
They are also frequently seen in pairs, so spotting these two together today is not unusual. During nesting season, the female builds an especially impressive home: a long woven pouch suspended from the end of a tree branch, carefully constructed from grasses and plant fibers. Their main nesting period in Costa Rica occurs earlier in the year, so today’s pair was most likely simply moving through familiar territory, searching for food, resting, or exploring the vegetation around Town.
For birds dressed almost entirely in shades of orange, black, and gold, they can still be surprisingly easy to miss among the trees. Today’s sighting offered one of those small opportunities to look a little more closely at the life moving between Town and the ecosystem around it.
So, if you are strolling through Las Catalinas today, keep an eye out for a flash of orange, whether flying past or perched nearby. Our two little flying neighbors may still be around.