Wildlife Watching at Tirimbina: Rainforest, Bridges and Close Encounters

Keen to experience the magic of the tropical rainforest in Costa Rica? Love spotting wildlife on your travels? Then spend a couple of days wildlife watching in Tirimbina Lodge and Rainforest Center, a rainforest reserve known for its suspension bridges, colourful birdlife, frogs, and close-up mammal encounters.

Tucked inside a protected patch of beautiful rainforest in northeastern Costa Rica, Tirimbina Biological Reserve serves as a research station as well as a lodge. It is home to Costa Rica’s longest suspension bridge, stretching 262 meters over the Sarapiquí River, as well as canopy walkways that place you directly among birds and tree-dwelling wildlife. It is also one of the more affordable places in the country to stay within an active rainforest reserve.

Tirimbina is well known for its population of Honduran white bats, but as luck would have it, recent floods destroyed the patch of Heliconia where the bats used to roost, and the chances of finding them elsewhere on the property were pretty slim.

But there is much more to Tirimbina than the bats alone. From toucans and poison dart frogs to sloths encountered on the suspension bridges, we spent two nights wildlife watching here and had some of the best encounters of our entire Costa Rica trip.

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Night walk at Tirimbina Lodge

One of the highlights of our stay at Tirimbina was the guided night walk, so we decided to tag along on the spotlighting walk to see what critters were out and about. The walk started with the crossing of the suspension bridge, and that bridge is long. Very long. Thankfully, the world below it was engulfed by darkness, so you couldn’t really tell how high above the river you were.

The bridge had definitely seen better days, when the wooden planks comprising the floor were not missing, and the rails didn’t open into the black void now and then. But we did come across a northern raccoon (and thwarted his bridge-crossing plans), and a Hoffman’s two-toed sloth sitting in a tree by the side of the bridge.

Amphibians were out in force. We spotted emerald glass frogs, brilliant forest frogs, broad-headed rain frogs and dink frogs. We also came across both a fer-de-lance and a false fer-de-lance, as well as a white-headed snake.

Tirimbina, while quiet at night, still has the feel of an active research centre, with insect traps stashed in corners and a pair of mud-encrusted gum boots leaning against the wall. If you’ve ever wondered what life is like for a tropical field researcher, Tirimbina gives you a small taste of it.

Wildlife encounters at Tirimbina

The following morning, we had an early breakfast at the lodge, and as we sat on the veranda of the still-empty restaurant, the air was filled with the crackling sounds of frog calls coming from every flower bed around us. There seemed to be frogs everywhere — we just couldn’t see them.

Eventually, our efforts paid off when we discovered tiny strawberry poison dart frogs. You would think it would be easy to spot a frog with a vividly red body and bright blue legs among the brown leaf litter, but they are so small that it took some serious effort to locate them at first. Once we knew what we were looking for, we soon became experts at finding them, and they were suddenly everywhere around the restaurant.

Later that morning, we returned to the lodge grounds to spend some time birdwatching. Of all the places we visited in Costa Rica, Tirimbina was probably the best bird-watching spot. We saw some real stunners: magnificent keel-billed toucans, collared aracaris and a number of black-mandibled toucans.

One of the toucans I was trying to photograph was very restless, constantly moving and shifting on the branch and making quite a racket. Only later, when I looked at my photographs, did I discover the reason for the bird’s agitation.

Camouflaged among the green leaves, a green iguana was sitting on the same branch. Obviously, neither the bird nor the lizard felt like having company, and considering the size of the toucan’s bill, the iguana had a lot more to lose than its perch.

Green iguanas were everywhere around the lodge. They are probably the most frequently encountered animals in Costa Rica, and most of them were much easier to spot, despite their excellent camouflage.

If you’re interested in staying overnight to experience the night walks and early-morning wildlife, check availability for Tirimbina Lodge.

Exploring the trails and bridges

Exploring the trails at Tirimbina offers a very different perspective on the reserve. To reach the reserve from the lodge, you have to cross one of Costa Rica’s longest suspension bridges, stretching 262 metres and hanging 22 metres above the Sarapiquí River.

I had been a little nervous crossing it the night before in total darkness, but in broad daylight I found it even more intimidating, exciting and nerve-wracking. For once, you can see exactly how far you could fall, and just how long the bridge really is. It feels endless. And being a suspension bridge, it’s not the most stable terrain, so even if you’re not afraid of heights, crossing it is quite an experience.

The canopy suspension bridge is not as long as the one over the river, but it is higher above the forest floor. Stretching for 110 metres at a height of 35 metres, it places you right next to birds and canopy-dwelling mammals.

The most entertaining birds of the day were White-fronted nunbirds that looked exactly like little nuns. There were also Northern Barred-Woodcreeper, Black-crowned tityra, Shining honeycreeper, Chestnut-headed Oropendola, Montezuma Oropendola, Rufus moaner, Bronze tailed plumelater, Purple throated fruit crow, Olive backed ethonia and a Squirrel coockoo.

This was all well and good, but our main reason for coming to Tirimbina had been to see the Honduran white bats. Unfortunately, recent floods had destroyed their roosting habitat, and no one knew where the bats had moved to. Our guide suggested visiting La Selva Biological station, where the bats could be found as well. We did just that. And for something different, we returned to La Selva for the night walk.

Hoffman’s Two-toed Sloth Encounter

On our last night in Tirimbina, it started to rain about 4 am and kept raining until 8 am. We fought the temptation to stay in our beds on a rainy morning, and once it was reasonably dry, we headed back to the Canopy Bridge for the last bit of wildlife watching at Tirimbina.

The forest was quiet after the rain, but we remained on the bridge, watching the small stream meandering through the jungle floor below and hoping to spot a thirsty mammal coming in for a drink.

We were so intent on looking away from the bridge that I got a fright when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a large shape approaching us along the top support cable of the bridge. When I turned around, I could barely believe my eyes.

A female sloth with a young clinging to her belly was steadily making her way across in broad daylight. She was already no more than 3 meters away from us.

Since she looked a bit miserable, wet from the night’s rain, we decided that she was eager to get to the top of the canopy to find a sunny spot to dry out. And she was making impressive progress. Nowhere near as slow as I would imagine a sloth to move, she was weaving her way around the vertical cables of the bridge. She seemed incredibly agile.

All but ignoring us, she passed right above our heads, heading for the opposite end of the bridge. Once she got level with the trees growing next to the bridge, she started looking for a way to climb up, but there were only thin and wobbly lianas within her reach.

We were certain she would realise the futility of her attempts and find a better spot to cross over. There was no way such an ungainly animal would make such a delicate crossing. But she proved us wrong. Without much hesitation, she grabbed the closest liana, lifted herself up, and with just a couple of movements, maneuvered herself onto the tree. I was absolutely and totally impressed.

Once she made it onto the firm branches of the trees, she let her young go for a little wander – must’ve needed a rest after such an epic adventure.

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