Quetzal Monteverde Costa Rica
On your travels to Costa Rica are you planning to go to Monteverde? If so you may be lucky and see the most beautiful bird in the rain forest, the resplendent Quetzal. Yes, Quetzals can be found deep in the Monteverde Cloud Forest reserve. They make their nests in holes in the trees. The female lays two light blue eggs. Then both she and the male take turns sitting on the eggs to incubate them.
The quetzal is found in the highland cloud forest from Mexico all the way down through Central America. To the Mayas and the Aztecs, the quetzal was sacred. They used the tail feathers from the male in their headdresses. Guatemala’s monetary unit is called the quetzal.
In was in the month of August that I was very lucky and spotted a Quetzal not long after I started my hike into the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve. What a sight! It was a male with his long tail feathers, seeming about two feet long. Our guide said we were extremely lucky because this bird is reclusive and very hard to spot.
