This handsome specimen has been in my Costa Rica gallery for a while, but I just realized that it was incorrectly identified as a Honduran White Bat. It is actually a northern ghost bat — much larger and without the yellow nose of the Honduran species. This particular ghost bat would roost every day just outside of my lodge in south western Costa Rica at a place called Tiskita.
Nikon D200 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 320mm with Nikon 1.7 teleconverter) ISO 400, f/4.8 at 1/8th of a second, cable release and Gitzo tripod

This is a photo that has been in my Costa Rica gallery but has never been posted to the blog. If nothing else, the kinkajou is my favorite animal name. They are also sometimes called honey bears. Strictly nocturnal, they are rarely seen by humans and I was pretty excited when I got this shot. I was out spotlighting on my own, which is very difficult because usually I need someone to shine a light on the animal so that I can acquire focus. I had to position my headlamp in just the right spot on my head so that it was pointing directly at the kinkajou while I was looking through the viewfinder. All came together nicely and I was able to get several exposures while the kinkajou munched on what appears to be some sort of pineapple-like fruit.
Nikon D200 with Nikkor 70-200mm lens (at 150mm) ISO 400, f/5.6 at 1/60th of a second, two Nikon SB-800 flash units mounted to a bracket

This will be my last post for a couple of weeks as we fly to Quito and then on to the Galapagos Islands tomorrow. We’ll also be making a stop on the way back in the cloud forest of Ecuador. I haven’t photographed one of my favorite subjects in a while — frogs — and am looking forward to searching for some new species when I get there. This photo of a green and black poison dart frog was taken in Costa Rica back in 2007.

Per request, one more from my Costa Rica trip from a few years ago. This three-toed sloth was giving himself a nice — albeit slow and deliberate — scratch to the midsection with those big claws. The sun had almost set and I had to use a tripod and a very slow shutter speed of 1/20th of a second, but with the way that these guys move, it wasn’t a problem getting sharp focus.

Tamanduas are a genus of anteater. The southern tamandua ranges throughout South America, while the northern lives all the way up into Mexico. This guy was photographed in Corcovado National Park in southwestern Costa Rica. I took several long hikes through the rainforest of Corcovado and actually saw quite a few tamanduas — sometimes in trees and sometimes on the ground.  Interesting fact of the day: they don’t have teeth, but instead rely on their powerful gizzard to break down food — mainly termites and ants.

This is another one from Costa Rica. I was photographing the local waterfall at Tiskita when I saw this damsel fly sitting on a leaf. It was very cooperative and waited patiently while I changed lenses to get a macro point of view.

I’m not sure of the exact species on this hummingbird, but it’s just one of the many that I saw at the Tiskita Lodge in Pavones, Costa Rica. The flower the hummingbird is perched upon, however, is clearly a species of heliconia.

Agouti’s are native to Central America and resemble guinea pigs, but they are larger and with longer legs. This one was photographed early one morning in Pavones, Costa Rica. They are fairly common in rain forests and I saw quite a few while hiking throughout several areas of Costa Rica.

This sexy beast is a thee-toed sloth. It graced my presence in a place called Pavones in south western Costa Rica, not too far from the Panama border. Sloths move so slow that algae easily grows on their fur (moths also like to live in there). The algae shares a symbiotic relationship with the sloth — the sloth providing a home for the algae and the algae providing camouflage for the sloth.

Back to Costa Rica for today’s photo of the day. These two squirrel monkeys were photographed just outside the lodge that I was staying at in Pavones, near the Panama border. Squirrel monkeys travel in large troops, sometimes up to 500. They are very small, growing to just about 13 inches (not including the tail) and weighing just 2 and a half pounds. Falcons and eagles are their main predators, but the fact that they travel in such large groups enables them to fend off most attacks. And just in case you needed one more wikipedia interesting fact of the day — “Female squirrel monkeys have a pseudo penis that they use to display dominance over smaller monkeys, in much the same way the male squirrel monkeys display their dominance.” Just in case you were wondering.