Lynn had a last swim in the pool this morning while Doug and I walked up the hill to the moth trap. After the disappointment of the few moths a couple of nights ago last night was very different - over 50 species, quite a few that we hadn't seen before and many in good condition so we spent a while going through them and photographing them as best we could. It was a struggle to get them all done and get down to breakfast in time before it was all gone. The Panasonic Lumix does ok using flash with the larger moths but its pretty rubbish for the micros and we didn't have time to wait for the light to improve.
After saying goodbye to the lovely staff at Los Helechos we set off for Santa Clara about 11am and made a short stop by the road near Trinidad because we saw some butterflies. Amongst them was a Confusing Yellow Pyrisitia larae which was an excellent find. Confusing it certainly is but the wavy inner edge to the black tip of the forewing is distinctive. And we also saw the much commoner Boisduval's Yellow Eurema boisduvaliana with its distinctive 'cut-off' wing shape, and a female Antillean Flasher Astraptes xagua looking for somewhere to lay.
We had booked to stay at the Hotel Los Caneyes which is in the countryside just west of the city and from looking on Google maps it looked to have good adjacent habitat. I had also seen on the reviews that it had Antillean Palm Swift nesting in the thatch of the hotel entrance. That and the fact that it had what looked like a nice pool made it seem a good choice.
The swifts put on a fantastic display as we arrived. I soon discovered its not easy photographing swifts in flight! And this was the best I managed. The birds were nesting all along the lower edge of the thatch and there must have been dozens of nests all with either recently fledged, or about to fledge, young. They were even nesting in the lower thatch on the right so standing in front trying to take pictures meant the birds would fly past and touch my head as they went in.
At check in they told us we were only booked in half board despite the fact that we had paid full board and that was shown on our voucher that we handed in. This is what happens at most hotels and is frankly pretty tedious. On this occasion they were quite helpful and after a couple of quick emails with our booking agent in Habana they agreed that it was full board. It seems likely the information is entered on their system remotely but whoever does this they clearly think that some people will pay the extra. At Hotel Hanabanilla the girl on the desk even refused to phone the agent in Habana to confirm what was on the voucher saying that it was my problem and that I would have to phone! And they had run out of internet cards so I wasn't even able to email them. I waited till another girl took over on the desk and she kindly agreed to let me use their computer to email the agent so it was then quickly sorted. The only hotel where this doesn't seem to happen is Los Helechos. I have a feeling that because we stay longer than any other people going there and we pay for guided trips every day they value our custom a little more. Apart from the all-inclusive hotels where outside companies have a large say in how the hotel is run, all other hotels in Cuba are state-run so the service you get is very different. Sometimes it is fine and at other times it can be dire. Los Caneyes is in a beautiful setting with lovely rooms, excellent food, terrible coffee and a nice pool that on this occasion was empty due to repairs! Oh well that's Cuba! The alternative is to stay in casas particulares where in our experience they can never do enough for you and the meals are far too much for us to eat.
We dumped our bags in our rooms and headed out to explore the gardens and spotted a Red-striped Leafwing Siderone galanthis flying around amongst the trees. As we watched and to our surprise it seemed to settle on the ground, and when we slowly approached we could see it feeding on a fallen mango which the free range chickens had mostly eaten. We edged closer and closer and I ended up taking this from three inches away with a compact camera. I hadn't expected that from a species normally so wary. Doug also found a larva of Common Long-tailed Skipper Urbanus proteus.
We dumped our bags in our rooms and headed out to explore the gardens and spotted a Red-striped Leafwing Siderone galanthis flying around amongst the trees. As we watched and to our surprise it seemed to settle on the ground, and when we slowly approached we could see it feeding on a fallen mango which the free range chickens had mostly eaten. We edged closer and closer and I ended up taking this from three inches away with a compact camera. I hadn't expected that from a species normally so wary. Doug also found a larva of Common Long-tailed Skipper Urbanus proteus.
Red-striped Leafwing Siderone galanthis 17 Jun 2018 Los Caneyes, Santa Clara © Tim Norriss
We had chosen rooms the furthest away from the pool area in case there was any late night music and to improve our chances of being able to run the moth trap. Any moths will have to run the gauntlet of the chickens and these two Helmeted Guineafowl that roamed the gardens. At dusk I had a brief view of what could only be a Cuban Nightjar, a pretty unsatisfactory sighting of a new bird for me. And of course there were also the obligatory Greater Antillean Nighthawks overhead. I can't believe that we haven't seen these before on our summer visits to Cuba.
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