WHERE TO GO BIRDING IN PERU

The cloud forest above Oxapampa and Yanachaga-Chemillen national park offer excellent birding. The road between Oxapampa and Pozuzo gives easy access to good forest and good birding. Other parts of the park are more remote and trekking is the only option. An option outside the park can be found 5.5 km south of Oxapampa on the main road, where a side road to the left and eventually reaches some antennas at about 2700 m. The upper part of this strech offers excellent birding in good cloud forest. Allow about an hour to get here. The best option is to camp up here but comuting from Oxapampa is possible. Cloud-forest Screech-owl is endemic to this area and also a undescribed form of Rufous Antpitta with a distinct voice. Lots of other good birds are available here like, Olive Tufted-flycatcher, Masked Fruiteater, Red-ruffed Fruitcrow, Chestnut-crested Cotinga, White-throated Screech-owl, Bay Antpitta, White-eared Solitaire, White-capped Tanager, Yellow-scarfed Tanager to mention a few.

Villa Rica is the coffee capital of Central Peru. It makes a nice base for several days of birding in the vecinity. Many sites are explained in detail in Thomas Valquis Where to find birds in Peru.

Laguna Oconal. 1500m. This large marshland has birds both from the Andes and from the lowlands. It is a good place to see Blackish Rail as well as Rufous-sided Crake. Wattled Jacana, Purple Gallinule, Masked Duck, Little Blue and Striated Heron are other marshbirds here. The nearby coffee-plantations are good for Coraya Wren, Cabani's and (Southern) Plain-crowned Spinetails as well as Black-faced Tanager. Olivaceous Greenlet can often be heard and responds readily to playback. Tataupa Tinamou has also been heard nearby. Valqui reports Striped Owl and Scissor-tailed Nightjars as possible nightbirds here.

Hacienda El Carmen: The coffee plantations near the still forested Carmen ridge are still more rustic in preserving original shade trees rather than recently planted Inga and Albizia shade-trees. Thus there are more bromeliads in the trees and many large and old trees with other epifytes. This is the kind of habitat preferred by the rare migrant Cerulean Warbler.
Also look here for Lanceolated Monklet, Versicolored Barbet and Creamy-bellied Antwren.

Other birds mentioned for this area are Band-bellied Owl, Pain-billed Crake, Sooty-headed, Plumbeous-crowned and Red-billed Tyrannulets, White-bellied Pygmy-Tyrant and Straw-backed Tanager.

El Cumbre: Unfortunately it is only the top of this road that is mentioned in Valqui that is worth birding now. Much of the previous forests lower down on the Villa Rica side have recently been turned into Eucalyptus plantations  as part of a reforestation scheme (sic!). However, the top is still very good. Many of the species that can be seen on the Antenna road and the top of the Villa Rica-Oxapampa road can also be searched for here.

Road to Oxapampa:
This road is not mentioned in Valquis book, because it has only recently been completed. It is basically the same area mentioned as canal de piedras in Valqui´s book.
Birding can be excellent still. A lodge is being built on the Oxapampa side of the pass - but the pass is less than 50 minutes from either Oxapampa or Villa Rica, why one can easily use any of these towns as your base.

Some of the birds seen here include:  Creamy-bellied Antwren at around km 4 in high trees,  Red-throated Caracara (goes remarkably high here), Black-winged Parrot, Barred Parakeet, Blue-banded Toucanet, Swallow-tailed Nightjar, Rufous-webbed Brilliant, Green-fronteded Lancebill, Crimson-bellied Woodpecker, Tyrannine Woodcreeper, Bay Antpitta, Large-footed Tapaculo, Chestnut-crested Cotinga, Masked Fruiteater, Red-ruffed Fruitcrow, Inca Flycatcher, Peruvian Wren, Rufous-bellied Bush-Tyrant, Pale-footed Swallow, Spotted Nightingale-Thrush, White-capped Tanager, Vermillion Tanager, Tricoloured Brush-Finch,
Strange Pyrrhura parakeet seen by David Geale and others. Maybe the same strange parakeet as seen by Roger Ahlman at Pampa Hermosa. Roger reports Red-crowned Parakeet from here. Maybe it is the same birds referred to. In any case - look out for strange Pyrrhuras in this area.

El Paujil - Yanachaga-Chemillin National Park: Lowland forest with Tapir lick during daytime! More info soon to follow.

San Mattias Ridge: On road to Puerto Bermudaz. More info soon to follow. Not clear which Porrhura parakeets are here (recorded by Alex Duran and Antonio Coral).

San Ramon: Here are two interesting areas. Alto Picchita and Pampa Hermosa.