Lesson’s Motmot, Clarion Hotel, Copan Ruins, Honduras

This is not the first bird I saw in Honduras this trip, of course. There were flybys on the road and both Black and Turkey Vultures everywhere, blackbirds around the hotel and doves…but this Lesson’s Motmot is the first bird I stopped to photograph in Honduras…just as it was the first bird I photographed in Costa Rica last year. Lesson’s Motmot has to have a high chance of being the first compelling photograph worthy bird in any Central American country you visit…and if the Lesson’s Motmot does not stop you and get your camera up, then you really are just too jaded to be in the tropics anyway! This bird, typically, was sitting on a branch under deep canopy in the semi-darkness, but it was very cooperative, turning on its branch so to give me a view of all sides. That tail is really something. They tell me that the tail feathers are not that way when they first come in…that the bob at the end is a wear pattern, but it is so consistent in Motmots that I, with my limited knowledge of their behavior, can not imagine how it always wears just that perfect way to produce the bob. It was dark in the tropical dry forest where I found this bird, and the exposures are pushing the limits of my Sony’s 1 inch sensor. I hope to find more Lesson’s Motmots in better light before the trip is over. Sony RX10iv at 600mm. Program mode with the ISO set to keep shutter speed at 1/500th. 1/500th @ f4 @ ISO 2000. Processed in Polarr.