Species of the day: Violet Sabrewing! This is also one of our focal species. We’ve found that these can travel kilometers across landscapes and may be the best pollinators of heliconia because they bring outcross (genetically unrelated) pollen. This photo does not do the violet much justice.

Species of the day: Anole Lizard! This is a tough one to spot, and even harder to catch – but Ava found it (and snapped this shot) and Miles caught one today.

Species of the day: Speckled tanager! Every morning extra bananas are put out – which attracts a large number of native tanagers. This is one of our favorites.

First species of the day for 2014! This time, Ava, Miles and Anna are here, so this is for other kids (big and small) that enjoyed the photos last year – you know who you are. Chestnut-mandibled toucan! Why is the toucan bill so large? People have wondered about this for a long time, but recently scientists found that they use it partly to stay cool. They can change their own temperature as much as 10 degrees C in a few minutes using the beak as a sort of radiator.

Hi. My name is Ava Catherine Betts, and I am spending two months with my family at a biological field station in Costa Rica.  My father is a biologist studying hummingbirds and Heliconia flowers.  The field station is called Las Cruces and it is outside of a little town called San Vito.  There is a large tropical garden where all the research facilities are located (dining hall, library, cabins, lab, and reception center) and a jungle for the scientists to study.

 We eat our meals together in the dining hall.  There is a large outdoor balcony where we can eat and watch the birds fly around the garden and the jungle trees.  I get to meet the other students, scientists and tourists visiting every day.  The staff who make our meals help us learn Spanish every day.  They call my little sister, Anna (3 years old), Annita (little Anna) because she is very small.  We can now all say our greetings like “Hello” – Hola, “How are you” – Como esta?,”very good” – muy bien and “thank-you” – gracias.   This week, we found some particularly cool species. We saw (birds) the silver throated Tanager, the blue crowned Mot-mot, the cherry’s Tanager, the speckaled Tanager, the green Honeycreeper, the chestnut mandibled Toucan, the white crowned Parrot, the blue headed Parrot, the violet saber wing Hummingbird, the stripe throated Hummingbird, the scaly breasted Hummingbird, the green hermit Hummingbird, the rufous tailed Hummingbird, the scarlet Macaw, the golden hooded Tanager, the crested Guan, the slate throated Redstart, and the spot crowned Euphonia. We also found some (mammals) agoutis, a troop of coatis, and squirrels. Here, Heliconias are very common. There are lots of banana plants and palm trees around. Clearly, there are a lot of birds in Costa Rica. We also saw an amazing frog called a glass frog.

The climate is very different to ours (which you would expect, it being near the equator and all). The trees here look like giant ferns .At least, a lot of them. The houses \cabins are small (in fact, so small that not all of us can fit in it at night (at least, while we are sleeping). Anna, Miles, and Mum share Tinamu (one of the cabins) and Dad and I share Calibri. We think it is fun that Dad is in the cabin named “hummingbird” in Spanish because he is studying hummingbirds!  There are many ants in the cabins at night. In Mum’s cabin, I think they might like the toilet. On Sunday, we went to the ocean.  It was a two hour drive but worth the while. If you don’t mind feeling like you have a fire in your throat, than feel free to go body surfing in the waves.  On the other hand, DO NOT go in the water. The water is so salty if you swallow 1 milliliter of the water, it WILL feel like you have a fire in your throat. If you like coconuts, come to this beach. The beach is perfect for everything. So far, I like Costa Rica because… oh whatever. It would take at least an hour to list every single reason! So, stay tuned for more.