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2012 marked our third consecutive Christmas tour to the Pousada Rio Roosevelt, and by far the driest of the three tours. We barely pulled out our raingear, which is quite unusual for this time of year. River levels were reasonably high. I learned that torrential rains came much later, in March-April 2013, dumping so much rain that the Roosevelt rose to a record level, flooding the dining room!! Wow, that's hard to imagine, one heckuva lot of water. The dry conditions were ok for us, and probably didn't interfere much with birding although song in the dawn chorus was somewhat subdued.

As usual, we started off with a bit of birding around the capital of Rondonia state, Porto Velho, followed by a couple of nights near Humaitá, west of the Madeira. Our first evening marked one of the great tour highlights, in my opinion, as we witnessed an incredible show of Purple Martins coming to roost near the bank of the Madeira right in town. There were easily over half a million birds -- I estimated around 800,000 -- it was simply awesome to see the numbers build over the course of 30 minutes at dusk, then watch them begin to mass and swirl silently and ever more tightly before suddenly plunging some 400 vertical feet to land in about a dozen smallish trees surrounded by streetlights (which they always seem to prefer for night roosts) -- all of this going on as local folks went about their business of selling popcorn, skateboarding, strolling around, some occasionally glancing skyward. I have noticed numbers of Purple Martins increasing somewhat over the past three years, from low hundreds to low thousands, but this was a major leap upward, as large a concentration as they are likely to have anywhere in the winter range. Perhaps it has something to do with the construction of multiple dams nearby on the Rio Madeira; we'll see how it goes forward.

Then it was across the great Rio Madeira on the ferry (new bridge opening held up for political reasons) to head north along the west bank to Humaitá. A couple of Jabirus along the way was unusual but not unexpected in such a dry year. Our birding out of Humaitá proved quite productive, the number one stunner being terrific views of Ocellated Crake, which paraded across an opening in dense grass five times in three minutes; boy I wish they would always do that! We also enjoyed superb views of Ash-throated Crake and Azure Gallinule. Other grassland highlights included excellent views of Sharp-tailed Tyrant, the rarely seen Amazonian population of Black-masked Finch, and breeding Dark-throated (supposedly) seedeaters. Forest areas yielded fine views of the newly described Western Striolated-Puffbird and Predicted Antwren, the latter barely coming out from badly degraded habitat where a community of some 60 houses has sprung up over the past few years (no sign of the Campina Jays we'd lucked out seeing there last year, and I doubt they'll show there again).

The charter flight out to the Rio Roosevelt was spectacular, as fog had lifted and visibility was good. It was exciting to see the airstrip appear in the middle of the vast, green forest, just above the bank of the river. We quickly settled in for a week at the very comfortable pousada, and didn't see anyone on the river who was not at the lodge -- this is a truly remote place! Birding was very good! Mention of outstanding encounters would have to include a very cooperative Zigzag Heron (although he took his sweet time showing up!), Red-throated Piping-Guans and Razor-billed Curassows on river trips, brilliant Crimson-bellied Parakeets, good numbers of big macaws, and scope views of multiple Orange-cheeked Parrots and Kawall's Parrots; several Black-bellied Cuckoos, a fabulous Crested Owl that stayed put in the spotlight for a couple of minutes, and a vespertine show of nighthawks that will stay with me forever. We first noted a handful of Common Nighthawks high over the Roosevelt, then, as dusk started to settle, more than a hundred Sand-colored Nighthawks appeared low over the river, sharply flashing black-and-white. As we neared Santa Rita rapids, the river framed by towering orange and purple cumulus clouds, we realized that the upper levels were full of coursing Common Nighthawks, the most I'd ever seen anywhere on the wintering grounds -- it was a spectacular sight, those two species of Chordeiles over the Roosevelt that Christmas Eve. Continuing with the roster of great sightings, a male Pavonine Quetzal was a gorgeous find, we had unusually fine views of Rufous Motmot (rarely seen well in Amazonia), and we had great looks at all six possible species of jacamars. We saw Gould's Toucanet well, to go with a fine Golden-collared we'd seen earlier, across the Madeira at Humaitá. Best antbirds were Pearly Antshrike, Sclater's antwren, White-breasted Antbird, and several species described to science only in June, 2013, in the Special Volume of the Handbook of the Birds of the World: Manicore Warbling-Antbird, Roosevelt Stipple-throated Antwren, and Aripuana Antwren, the latter photographed nicely by Bob (his photo was published in HBW!). Also described in that volume was Chico's Tyrannulet, which I'd found on the 2009 tour -- we had fabulous views of a pair at the site or discovery! Other small flycatchers seen well included the little-known Buff-cheeked Tody-Flycatcher (it's actually a tody-tyrant) and Zimmer's Tody-Tyrant. An exploratory investigation of a campina led to a brief encounter with the Amazonian subspecies of Plush-crested Jay, a bird rarely seen on tours. Both Scaly-breasted and Musician wrens were heard and seen well, we got Tooth-billed Wren and Para Gnatcatcher, and special tanagers included Paradise, Green-and-gold, and a rare Dotted seen well.

We encountered seven species of primates this trip, including White-nosed Bearded Saki and Common Woolly Monkey. We also saw Neotropical River Otter, a small group of Giant Otters up very close (wow!), and three Brazilian Tapirs.

I very much enjoyed birding with all of you, and hope that this list helps bring back fond memories of our tour on the Rio Roosevelt, way back at Christmas last year! A couple of good things about having the list come out now is that all of the new species we kept talking about have now been formally described (in HBW), and their names are included on the following list, and the list uses the most up-to-date phylogenetic order (you'll notice a number of families showing up in different order than our tour checklist).

--Bret

KEYS FOR THIS LIST
One of the following keys may be shown in brackets for individual species as appropriate: * = heard only, I = introduced, E = endemic, N = nesting, a = austral migrant, b = boreal migrant

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS

Some of the outstanding extra critters we encountered included a huge "red-kneed" tarantula in the campos of Humaitá; that enormous Black Caiman that cruised around our boats; a minute Pseudogonatodes sp. leaf-litter gecko (perhaps the smallest of all vertebrares); the monstrous toad I still have not managed to get an ID for (right in the trail after a rain one afternoon); and the spectacular Prosthecea cochleata orchid Bob identified for us.

Totals for the tour: 363 bird taxa and 17 mammal taxa