Panama, the mariner's pathway between two oceans, is the ecologist's pathway between two vast continents. With forested mountains in east and west separated by the central lowlands, Panama constitutes both a land bridge for many species and a biogeographic barrier for numerous others, and it's a rich mixing ground for various elements of the avifaunas of North and South America. Panama hosts more than 970 species of birds, and this short tour to the birder's wonder of lowland Panama is designed as your pathway to almost a third of them.

If you've never birded the American tropics, you'll find that little is quite as exciting as coming upon: your first army ant swarm, attended--sometimes feverishly--by Ocellated, Bicolored, and Spotted antbirds, Plain-brown, Northern Barred-, Cocoa, and Black-striped woodcreepers, and Gray-headed Tanager; or a Cecropia tree full of frugivorous birds from Keel-billed and Yellow-throated toucans to Red-capped and Blue-crowned manakins; and lethargic species like trogons, puffbirds, and motmots that sit almost motionless, seemingly content to watch forest life go by.

Special Note: Our Field Guides tour is limited to eight participants so that we are ensured of riding in the same vehicle when we travel to and from birding sites. This also gives us a better participant-to-ornithologist/guide ratio in the field and at meals. We'll be accompanied by a local Tower guide who has the most up-to-date knowledge of the area. Our small group allows your Field Guides leader to more effectively impart the wealth of knowledge gained from years of experience in the Neotropics. This intimacy and expertise, as well as the smaller group size, are, we feel, well worth a slight premium.

Select the KEY INFO tab or click here for our itinerary plus space requests, status, fees, limits, and guides for any departure.

Client comment

"An excellent experience. We had a blast. Everything was fabulous. Guide John Coons is great — calm, funny and knowledgeable. If there were any glitches on this trip, we never heard about them. The local guides were really great. The Tower was fab. Oh, and we saw great birds, and lots of them! Tour Manager Ruth Kuhl in your office was very helpful and kind. Perfect." S.S., PANAMA'S CANOPY TOWER 2020

"A great experience. This was my second tour with Field Guides and both were excellent. I will definitely travel with you again. I really appreciate the full service offered by your company. It makes a difference to me that this is available." D.D., PANAMA'S CANOPY TOWER 2019