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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jos Stratford" data-source="post: 3513494" data-attributes="member: 12449">13 December. Altos de Lircay, Lake Colban & La Campana National Park.In the depths of thick tangles at Lircay lurk not only the exotic Chestnut-throated Huet-huets, but also all sorts of hard-to-see tapaculos. Fancied a few of these on this morning, but bar a calling Chucao Tapaculo in the depths of some bamboo, my dawn walk drew a blank ...probably didn't go far enough into the reserve. I did however get some excellent views of a pair of Chestnut-throated Huet-huet near the first stream as you enter the reserve and, as the day before, bumped into no end of Thorn-tailed Rayaditos, White-crested Eleanias and several White-throated Treerunners and Tufted Tit-Tyrants. Also one female Magellanic Woodpecker.With other potential sites for tapaculos later on in the trip, I didn't stay that long as I wanted to get round to the nearby Lake Colban before the worst of the day's heat hit. Small flocks of Austral Parakeets as I departed, so too Fire-eyed Diucon and common birds such as Chilean Mockingbird and Austral Thrush. A little over 30 minutes later, I arrived at the large Lake Colban – a little disappointing in that most of the shores seemed inaccessible, rafts of distant dots undoubtedly hid a few special birds, but amongst those a little closer, I picked out plenty of Chiloe Wigeon and Yellow-billed Pintail, a couple of Spectacled Teal, several dozen Neotropic Cormorants, a whole bunch of Red-gartered Coots, my first White-tufted Grebes and Great Grebes of the trip and assorted herons and egrets. I was not too disheartened however as my main target here was not a waterbird, but Burrowing Parrot, colonies of which were supposed to occur at the margins of the lake. Failed to find any at any of the limited access points to the lake, so tried a new strategy of slowly driving with the windows open hoping to hear a squawk or two. Ultimately this resulted in success – not at the lake itself, but a couple of kilometres beyond it where the feeder river has cut enormous cliffs into the sandy soil. Here, beside a small church at the edge of a village, two raucous Burrowing Parrots sat in the branches of a tree hanging over the edge of the cliff. I suspect they were breeding in the cliff, but either way they were most impressive, occasionally flying down to a shingle island mid-river, then rising back to this same overhang in a riot of colour and noise. Main target down, I then had a quick look round other parts of the lake, then stopped at a small place selling empanadas -fried cheese-stuffed things scoffed on a veranda with Grassland Yellow-Finches and Long-tailed Meadowlarks in a weedy field adjacent, two Chilean Pigeons flying over and a whole bunch of Black Vultures circling overhead. Also Shiny Cowbirds, Fire-eyed Diucons and Austral Blackbirds.Then back on the road, heading north again for 350 km to La Campana National Park near Valparaiso. Big flock of Chimango Caracaras en route, probably about 130 in all, then finally got to La Campana an hour or so before dark. Had ideas to camp in the reserve, but the gates were already closed, so had a quick look round – highlights being a Giant Hummingbird and a flock of about 150 California Quails – then went down to the nearby village to find accommodation. Settled into a nice place with fairly luxurious cabins, lawns with Southern Lapwings and a swimming pool, then awaited dark. Night time owling session was pretty good – one distant calling Rufous-legged Owl and, even better, several calling Austral Pygmy Owls, one of which had the good grace to sit in a roadside garden hooting away. Found this bird with out too much effort, then retired back to the cabin.</blockquote>

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