Hazel and I just got back from our trip to the rainforest! We had a blast, and that will be explained in another post, but we also saw and photographed TONS of wildlife! In this post I’ll introduce you to most of the species we saw by name and picture!
We couldn’t have done this without the great help of our guide Carlos, who was working for Amazon Trails Peru our tour operator. He did a really spectacular job!
Even though this post has a TON of pictures, there are many more on SmugMug. Check out our BEST photos, and the REST of them!
Reptiles and Amphibians
I saw each of these on my second night walk in the jungle, except the last two which we found during a daytime walk:
Phyllomedusa Palliata
Phyllomedusa Tomopterna- Oreobates Quixensis
Poison Dart Frog- Juvenile White Cayman!
Bugs
Only took a photo of a few of the bugs that we saw but the ones that I did get are impressive! Many of the nastiest were found on night walks.
Uropijio
Unidentified Gigantic Mosquito- Stick Bugs
- Centipede
Leaf-Cutter Ant
Bullet Ant
Grasshopper (giant) (first species)
Grasshopper (giant) (second species)- Cockroaches (So many!)
Owl Butterfly
Red Army Ants- Fire Ants
- War Spider
- Banana Spider
- Social Spider
Unidentified Red-Legged Spider- Blue Morpho Butterfly – AMAZING
- Tons of other beautiful butterflies, all unidentifiable
Mammals
Monkeys were the name of the game here! We saw a bunch of them and their behavior was really neat. Even saw some babies clinging to their mamas’ backs!
Wooly Monkey
Brown Agouti
Common Squirrel Monkey
Birds
We spent a lot of time looking at birds. They were by far the most abundant type of wildlife in the jungle and our guide Carlos was amazingly knowledgeable about what birds we did encounter!
- Greater Yellow-Headed Vulture
- White-Collared Jay
- Sand Martin
- White-winged Swallow
Green Jay
Chestnut-Fronted Macaw- Many, many hummingbirds, all unidentifiable
- Roadside Falcon
Squirrel Cuckoo- Blue and Yellow Macaw
Blue-Throated Piping Guan
Black-Fronted Nun Bird
Horned Screamer
Rufescent Tiger-Heron
Striated Heron (with a Smooth-Billed Ani for company)
Purple Gallinule- Blue-Headed Parrot
Hoatzin
Smooth-Billed Ani
Black-Tailed Trogon
Long-Tailed Tyrant
Short-Crested Flycatcher- Great Kiskadee
Social Flycatcher
Russet-Backed Oropendola- Yellow-Rumped Cacique
- Yellow-Tufted Woodpecker
Ladder-Tailed Nightjar
Red Cap Cardinal- Laughing Falcon
- Snowy Egret
- White-Throated Toucan
Blue-Banded Toucanet
Andean Cock of the Rock- Andean Guan
- Red-Necked Woodpecker
That leaves our count for about 3 days of bird watching at 34!
Fish
- Silver Sardine (Yummy!)
- Carachama
- Sinsangre
There are even some things we just forgot to write down. We saw so much wildlife! This doesn’t even count the many many different plants we were able to see and learn about on our trip!
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What a fabulous trip!! the color on the birds is always breathtaking! WEre you bitten by any of the bugs, or did they pretty much leave you alone. loved the poison dart frog—should see if i still have your essay!!
Totally jealous that you guys saw a hoatzin! ;)
Did you see any tarantulas?
Glad you guys made it to the Amazon. :) It’s my favorite place!
Hoatzin and cock of the rock????!!”!!
Massive.
Hi Mom!
We were only bitten by mosquitoes! Nothing else came really close to our cabin in the forest. I guess the bugs find more food in the jungle! It’s crazy how much weird wildlife and how many bugs there were just crawling around! I highly recommend it – our guide said that Park Manu is one of the most pristine sections of jungle left in Peru, so it is definitely worth a trip if you have the jungle bug!
Hi Heather,
We saw about 30 hoatzins! We went on this hike to a little lake where they were all perched around the edges. We also saw a juvenile which is a brilliant white color. Eventually we’ll get a photo on Smugmug.
No tarantulas, unfortunately. Apparently they eat them in the jungle! We loved the amazon!
Hi Nigel!
We got to see the mating ritual of the cock of the rock! At least 10 were dancing and croaking at a female who never showed herself. They’re really funny to watch!
And we saw tons of Hoatzin – there was a still lake we hiked to that had them everywhere. We got within 10 feet of several of them, which is one reason Hazel could get such clear, close photos of them.
Hi Justin! So amazing. It’s really cool that you guys have such great pictures and took such great notes. Did you see all of this while hiking? Are there some established roads? How did you keep such good notes of what (and how many of each) you were seeing?
Thanks Jacqueline! Most of the birds we saw while hiking around the Madre de Dios river. However, a number of species were found in the cloud forest which surrounds the road we took over the Andes – the wooly monkeys, cocks-of-the-rock, green jays and a few more were found there. As for roads, they got us most of the way there – but they frequently get blocked by mudslides during the rainy season. We took a different way back because of one that happened while we were staying in the jungle. At the end there was a 15 minute boat ride to the lodge. Once in the lodge there were no more roads – boat took us everywhere we needed to be.
We took good notes with the help of our guide. We’d go walking each day a few times and then write everything we saw down in our notebooks over some coffee when we got back. Between the three of us we managed to remember almost everything! All the animals were really striking so it was easy to remember what we saw and how many. I’m really glad we wrote it down that day because I’d never remember so much now!