Into the Mangroves

The host of our AirBnb connected us with a tour group down in Sierpe for a mangrove and monkey tour. It was the most amazing day of our whole trip. There were so many cool birds, monkeys, and wildlife, I could right a whole book, so I’ll just share some of the highlights.

Note: several of these images are courtesy of Katey Card.

We pulled away from the dock and encountered this big fella - the dreaded crocodile. He was 10-12 feet long and very handsome.

There were lots of Iguanas. This one swam from one side of the mangrove to the other, right in front of us. They move quickly, even in the water so they don’t get eaten by the crocodiles.

This is a Tiger Heron, sunning himself. They are vicious and will tear anything apart to eat it.

So many Macaws - in this very large tree there were 10-15, all squawking and playing. They mate for life so there are always two of them. When one dies, the other will not survive very long, but not just from a broken heart. They take care of each other and clean each other of bugs and parasites. When they aren’t cleaned, they will actually die from the damage of the bugs and parasites.

This was one of the most beautiful birds - so full of color.

There are two unique things in the picture. The funny cone shape on the right of the tree is a termite nest. This was a small one in comparison to some of the others we saw. On the left side of tree, you can see a dark mass. Any guesses on what that might be?

It’s a beehive, with all the bees swarming at the bottom of the hive.

Here was another interesting site - can you guess what all those black dots are on the tree? Yup, they are small sleeping bats - all in a row.

A turtle watched as we passed. He was just sitting on the log sunning himself.

We also found several snakes wound around a branch of a tree, but they were so hard to photograph as they looked like a part of the tree.