Along with the parrot clay licks, a visit to the canopy tower will be a highlight of your trip to Napo Wildlife Center. Our visit which was pretty typical involved the usual 5am wake up call (I set my alarm for 4am otherwise I couldn’t eat breakfast so early), a breakfast buffet, then off in the paddleboat across the lake. From there it’s about half a kilometer to the canopy tower through thick rainforest habitat. It’s really exciting to get our first glimpse of the tower!
It’s a long slog up the stairs to the top.
The view is awesome! We were lucky our guide had a scope as many of the birds were at quite a distance. I struggled to find them with my own camera even after the guide had them in the scope.
Let’s start with some mammals, here’s a Brown-throated Three-toed Sloth who was there for our whole visit.
Howler Monkeys
Plumbeous Pigeon
Slate-coloured Hawk
White-thoated Toucan
Many-banded Aracari
Russet-backed Oropendula
Crimson-crested Woodpecker
Those tiny specs are Cobalt-winged Parakeets. I told them to come to the clay lick tomorrow and bring all their friends!
Scarlet Macaws
White Hawk
Orange-winged Amazon Parrots
Look closely, what could that tiny blue speck be?
Maybe a Plum-throated Cotinga?
Or a Spangled Cotinga?
I called this the “Cotinga Tree” because we had both Spangled Cotingas and Plum-throated Cotingas showing up there.
This White Hawk was pretty far away and a good spot by our guide.
This Squirrel Cuckoo was pretty close.
And this shows why you need a really good guide with a really good scope. Do you see anything in this unedited photo?
What if I zoom in and crop out the cute little Black-headed Parrot (Caique)?
I practically had to be dragged off the tower kicking and screaming as the birding was so awesome! Back down on the ground, we had a leisurely walk back to the paddleboat.
Tiny frog
Cool looking tree, forgot what it’s called.
Poor tired husband!
This little Wire-tailed Manakin led me on a merry chase as he wouldn’t stand still for a photo!
Hah, gotcha! And with that, we went back to the lodge for lunch!