BirdForum is the net's largest birding community dedicated to wild birds and birding, and is absolutely FREE!

Register for an account to take part in lively discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="kittykat23uk" data-source="post: 1580082" data-attributes="member: 55291">We passed a sandbar with some nice Large-billed terns and Black Skimmers, before turning into a side channel. Julio told us that he saw three jaguars on the banks of this channel the week before, but we were not so lucky. He switched off the engine and let the current take us slowly down the river, paddling occasionally to steer us away from the banks. Julio set up some fishing rods and handed one to Ian. The plan was to try and catch some fish for the next day’s dinner. Julio used fruit to fish for Pacu. Whilst he gave Ian some steak with which to fish for Piranha! To catch Piranha you use steak covering a hook. The rods were makeshift jobbies made from bamboo. When you feel a nibble on your line you have to jerk the rod up to snag the fish. Ian had a go and managed to catch himself four Yellow-bellied Piranha and he also almost caught a Pacu. Julio dispatched three big Pacu for the table before Ian decided that fishing really wasn’t the sport for him. Julio said haw saw a trogon, but it was too distant for me to really get a good look at and we then headed back to camp, passing a roost of black capped herons on the way back. We also came across a caiman that had caught a fish.When we got out onto the main river we saw a flock of nighthawks hawking for insects. By that point the clouds had started to roll in again and it was threatening to rain. Julio told us that the weather was quite a-typical for the time of year. It’s fairly common for there to be a day or two of cloud because of a cold front coming from the Antarctic but it has not rained in August in Julio’s memory. But this year the rains came later than usual. Another thing that we heard was that the rivers are silting up and there are some places that you can now cross on horseback that would have required a boat a few years ago.  We were beginning to think that this would be the end of our jaguar sightings- with the weather having turned. Julio was very relieved that we had made a sighting on the first day, it took the pressure off somewhat and we were able to just take each day as it came. But as it turned out we needn’t have been concerned.</blockquote>

Verification