The 2023 Brazil Journals, Chapter Six

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Chapter Six

Horses and Rhinos?

 

 

 

That was pretty easy, and I wrote it while delousing my pet tapir.

—Greg Gutfeld

 

 

 

Had I been asked before this trip to liken the size of a South American tapir to any animal I knew, I would have guessed about the size of a large dog, say an Irish Setter or a German Shepard.   An Irish Wolf Hound at the most.

Big pig-sized.   

 

In my defense, tapirs don’t inhabit the forests of Alaska, so I never gave it much thought.   Bears and moose, yes.  Not tapirs.

All I had to go by were photos in books and I looked forward to the tapirs, giant anteaters, peccaries, giant river otters, caimans, and jaguars that were the animals we had good chances to see, according to the trip description.   I figured we had 50/50 chances.

 

So, you can imagine my astonishment when a tapir showed up at Trilha dos Tucanos during dinner!

 

The tapirs appeared on the forest bank at far right, though the adult walked right to this sign one night.   Sergio says it come as close as the steps to the veranda of the lodge once, apparently wanting more bananas.

One day it will go up the steps and into the dining room if they aren't quick enough with the bananas, I bet.

“It’s enormous!”  I said out loud as I marveled at the sheer bulk of this usually shy animal that was contentedly eating bananas tossed to it by its human audience.

 

I didn’t get any photos that first visit because I had broken my cardinal rule of not  going anywhere without a camera, even if it’s only my cell phone.

 

The next night I was prepared and it was even better!   The tapir had brought her sub-adult daughter and people were hand-feeding them.

Virginia feeds the tapir.

 

English-speakers pronounce their name “TAPE-er” or “TAA-per”.    Brazilians says “tah-PEER” or call them by their name in Portuguese, "anta," which sounds a lot like “UN-tah.”

 

Regardless of whether you pronounce them tapir or tapeer, tapirs are related to the horse and rhinoceros, though looking at them you’d suspect a little elephant in their background.   That’s because of their prehensile nose/lip that resembles a short trunk and is used for putting food in their mouth as well as breathing while underwater.

 

As for the rhinoceros background, the South American tapirs average six to eight feet in length, weigh between 330 and 710 lbs., and stand up to 43 inches at the shoulder.   For comparison: German Shepard and Irish Setter males are 26 inches;   an Irish Wolf Hound is 36 inches.

 

Imagine, an animal the size of a sheet of plywood, but with six or seven inches below the top.

 

As you can see from the videos, they love bananas.  Tapirs are herbivores, eating mostly plants and fruits and scattering seeds in their scat.   The average tapir can eat 75 lbs. of food per day.

Gullible feeds the tapir!

 

 

They are hunted for their meat and as a result tapirs stay away from human settlements.   It’s one reason why they are seldom seen.   Because their chosen habitat is the thick rainforest, they are difficult to study, but sources say they are endangered.

 

These tapirs live between 25 and 30 years both in the wild and in zoos.   Their predators, besides humans, are jaguars and crocodiles.

A raccoon ran in for its share of bananas, scaring the little tapir into the forest.   I'd never seen a raccoon before, either.

 

The largest tapir is the Malaysian tapir, which has a plentiful population.

  

I was smitten.   I wish all the tapirs in the world a long and healthy life.

 

 After the tapirs left, I went out on the quiet deck of the lodge and recorded the night sounds of the rainforest.

Mostly frogs.

The 2023 Brazil Journals, Chapter Five

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 Chapter Five

Save the Camera!

The camera is an instrument that teaches people 

how to see without a camera.

--Dorothea Lange

 

Sergio takes us down to the little creek in the rainforest where the Atlantic Royal Flycatcher is building her nest, then drives about a hundred feet uphill to park his car.

 

Knowing where the path is, I lead the way…until I find a snake coiled on the path.   It slowly makes its way to a big moss-covered tree and slithers up its trunk.  I'm frozen in place.  Then, after photos, of course, we make our way to the flycatcher.

The snake was too close to get a sharp photo.   Or something.

 

Sergio arrives, hears about the snake and wants to see it, so I take him back to the tree.   Harmless, he declares, but ever after that he always leads the way into the forest.   

 

He sits next to me on the small plastic chair and sets up a tripod to video the flycatcher in flight.   He gets his footage and we continue to shoot and wait for the little bird.

 

Suddenly, I see Sergio begin to tip over to his right, where the creek is.  I see him twist in mid-air and reach out with his arm to make sure the camera doesn’t go into the creek.   He saves both himself and the camera after a front leg of chair sinks in the soft earth.

 

It’s a situation photographers fear—losing their balance and damaging their expensive equipment.  Of the few times I've fallen with a camera, never once has the camera touched the ground because I've managed to twist so I land on my back.

 

“Save the camera” has become a serious, and yet comical, saying.   To heck with the person.   Save the camera!

It occurs to me that you might like to know where we are, so here's a map:

Right now, we are along the eastern coast of Brazil, having driven from São Paulo to the site marked "B" on the map, south of Rio de Janeiro.

 

After lunch, we head to the hummingbird set-up under the canopy.  Sergio removes all the feeders from the perimeter, leaving only one in the center.   Once the birds approach it regularly, he substitutes various  flowers on a tripod and the shooting begins.

 

This time, instead of a mass stampede, two of us shoot first and then the second two.   It works much better this way.

The synchronized flash set-up.

There are two funny things that occur.   Virginia and I both have hummers approach us closely.   We puzzle about this until we realize that my lens hood has red tape on it and Virginia's phone is tethered to her by a red strap around her neck.

 

So, with no words to distract you,  enjoy the hummingbirds:   

(One note--we begin with a white background then switch to dark green.)

Brazilian Ruby, so named for the red throat.

Brazilian Ruby

Note the tongue

Black-throated Mango

Brazilian Ruby

Brazilian Ruby

Jacobin

Long-tailed Hermit

Jacobin

Violet-capped Woodnymph

Brazilian Ruby

Brazilian Ruby

Brazilian Ruby

Black-throated Mango

The 2023 Brazil Journals, Chapter Four

 

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Chapter Four

Always Carry a Camera with You

 

 

Morning comes whether you set the alarm or not.

Ursula K. LeGuin

 

 

 

Once again, my cell phone intrudes into my life and makes itself necessary.  This time, it’s for its use as an alarm clock.

 

I brought a small travel clock for that specific purpose.   It also has a flashlight that comes on when you lift the clock off the night table.   Unfortunately, I can neither hear the alarm not use the flashlight feature because the latter doesn’t work.

 

I can’t hear the alarm on my phone either.   Virginia suggests putting it under my pillow and that works quite well.  

It takes a whole table to accommodate our cameras.

I suspect that if I turned on the phone right now and went to the clock app, I’d find an alarm set for 4:15 A.M.  Frankly, I don’t recall what time we met in the morning, but 5 A.M. seems about average.

 

At any rate, it’s early in the morning and dark when I head down the hill to the lodge.   The walk is somewhat treacherous because of tiny pebbles that threaten to act like ball bearings and propel my descent to the ground, and the nearby grass is wet with dew in the morning, so that is tricky walking also.

 

Our outings begin before breakfast.   We return to the lodge to eat after a couple hours.

 

Half way down the hill in the daytime.

This short video shows you the lavish breakfast spread.   You'll notice there are cakes.   Brazilians eat cake for breakfast!    Brilliant idea!

Sergio

Female Tuffted Antshrike

Male Tufted Antshrike

 

Wood Creeper

In the afternoon, Sergio shows us his hummingbird set up for photography.  A large, open-sided covered building, much like a car port, has a number of hummingbird feeders hanging and they were busy with hummers of all sorts.

There are four remote-triggered flashes on tripods and a hummingbird feeder in the center of them.  Our cameras will trigger the remotes.   Sergio replaces the feeder with real flowers.   Right now, he's getting the birds used to finding feed in the center.

Violet-Capped Woodnymph

Brazilian Ruby female

 

 

Violet Capped Woodnymph, I think

Jacobin

Black-throated Mango

As he continues to set up for the next day, he offers to let us try with the synchronized flashes.   It is, to put it mildly, a clusterf..k.

 

Multiple flashes going off on cameras and multiple frames-per-second shots that's don't allow the flashes to charge, plus the four flashes he’d set up, meant I didn’t get anything decent.   Slow down, he says, so we do.

 

But it is still an experiment to be fine-tuned tomorrow.

We spend every spare moment on the deck of the lodge getting shots of new birds.

Golden Chevroned Tanager

Olive-Green Tanager

 

Green-headed Tanager

Rufous-Tailed Jacamar

Blond-Tufted Woodpecker

I should mention that these three nights at Trilha dos Tucanos are called a “pre-extension” to the Complete Pantanal trip.   Many of these trips offer pre or post extensions to the main tour, and that’s what we’d signed up for.

 

That evening during dinner, several people leave their tables and go outside.   “Tapeer!”  one says.   I follow.

 

There, on a dirt bank of the edge of a forest is an enormous animal.  We call it a tapir, pronounced “TA-per”  or "TAPE-er." The Brazilians call it “anka” in Portuguese or “tah-PEER” in English.

 

I had no idea they were so big!

 

I am without a camera of my cell phone so all I can do is watch in wonder as the tapir eats bananas.   Yes, more bananas.

 

Eventually, I ask Sergio to drive me up to my room so I can get my cell.    He does but the tapir is gone when I get back.   On the back deck, also eating bananas is another animal I’ve never seen before—an opossum!

Another critter to marvel at as it nonchanlantly munches on the soft yellow fruit.

 

Tomorrow, I promise, I won’t be without a camera if the tapir comes back.

 

 

Saffron Finch in the rafters.

  

 

 

 

Manakin

 

 

For fun, look at this manakin courtship display:  swallow tailed manakin display

Black-Throated Grosbeak

Saffron Toucanet