ML64607191

Age and sex

Adult, Unknown sex - X

Media notes

Great Potoo, see text at the details section

Observation details

On the night of September 29-30, 2009, around midnight, I got startled by a strange call (Green Hills Butterfly Ranch, Chiquibul Road, Cayo District, Belize, UTM E: 289900 N: 1891220 / 17°05’52.17”N, 88°58’26.60”W). After some searching I saw a large bird sitting on a dead snag next to the house which would produce the call at irregular intervals. The bird had large bright orange eye-shine, but would turn away its head once I put my flashlight on it. Initial thought was an owl. It was sitting very upright to the extent of leaning backward a little. The head was very large but through the binoculars, I couldn’t really see it well. As soon as I put a flashlight on the bird, it would turn its head. The only thing, I thought I was able to see was a fairly pale breast with darker wings and a fairly long tail. There appeared to be some lighter spots on the backside. All of this was very vague; my flashlight was not that strong. Nevertheless it was obvious that this was a large bird. I estimated it to be at least 50 cm (20”) total length. In spite of the nocturnal conditions I took some pictures (Canon Powershot SX10-IS) using my flashlight as light source. One of these pictures ended up showing the outlines of the bird in some grainy detail. The call was most startling. Nothing like I recalled hearing before. It was quite loud, very “throaty”, and on occasion even human like. There was some variation. Mostly some drawn out “Kgroooooow”, repeated after a couple of seconds, occasionally a shorter “Wchow” , which was more human like, like someone hailing you from a distance. Using the same digital camera I recorded a video file with attached sound file for about a minute.

Technical information

Model

Canon PowerShot SX10 IS

ISO

250

Focal length

100 mm

Flash

Flash fired, auto, red-eye reduction

f-stop

f/5.7

Shutter speed

1/60 sec

Dimensions

1334 pixels x 1778 pixels

Original file size

1.9 MB