Quite the discovery

     As much as I have come to love this part of Yucatan, the blindingly white pavement, near-constant presence of humans, and (to my Ohio eyes) undersized trees, tend to leave me hankering for serious green after a few weeks. Fortunately, natural areas are never very far away in this peninsula, and recently, tireless birder (and professional-quality photographer) friend Kate discovered a list of wildlife hotspots inside Merida itself. It should surprise no one that exploration of these urban oases is now on our calendars.

     Yesterday, we visited Parque Ecológico del Poniente with a friend who has lived in Yucatan for more than four decades but had not known of the park's existence. Tucked into a busy neighborhood near Merida's psychiatric hospital, this relatively small site kept us busy for hours with birding,

Photo courtesy of Laurie Frey-Baquedano

botanizing,

 

Ludwigia octovalvis growing near the park's large pond

and sometimes just relaxing.

Created from a former rock quarry, the park is home to massive-for-Yucatan trees colonizing the bare rock left by long-ago bulldozers.

Over the years, the scars in the rock have become home to what looks like maidenhair fern 

as well as some quite impressive iguanas.

The focus of the day was intended to be birding, and Poniente did not disappoint. A heavily-traveled jogging path brought sightings of orioles, warblers, gnatcatchers, and--perhaps the sighting of the day--a pair of red-lored parrots checking out a tree cavity.

Photo courtesy of Kate Fitzgerald

The lower portion of the old quarry is flooded, and this human-created wetland hosts more water birds than I expected to see in a city of nearly a million people. Besides the dozens of ducks that have moved in (and taken up fishing, one particularly enterprising fowl beating a small fish to death and eating it while we watched), the pond yesterday featured anhingas,

Photo courtesy of Kate Fitzgerald

the usual herons, egrets,

and a number of small wading birds. A totally unexpected sighting was a wood stork, at first taken for an ibis but unmistakable when it took to the water and began its open-mouthed hunting of small creatures. For sheer entertainment value, however, nothing surpassed the northern jacana, sometimes called the "Jesus bird" because of the way its large feet allow it to walk on water, or at least on floating vegetation.

Photo courtesy of Kate Fitzgerald

Before leaving Merida, we decided to check out a nearby park, the confusingly-named Parque Arqueo-ecológico del Poniente. This much-larger park features several kilometers of narrow, winding trails and another flooded quarry. Being ready for lunch, we did not stay long, but we will definitely go back.