DFO Presents ". . . You’d Better BELIZE it!" Jan. 26 at 7pm

[David Suddjian]

Birding former British Honduras?

You’d Better BELIZE it!

Eduardo Ruano and Ruben Arevalo,

Belizean bird guides

With DFO: Monday, January 26, 2026

7 p.m. MST via Zoom

 

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_U57iTrHRTA6sJtNSUwCQbw

  

Formerly British Honduras until gaining independence from Great Britain in 1981, Belize is known to travelers as an English-speaking vacation mecca (also Spanish and Creole) of beaches, snorkeling and diving, rainforest adventuring and ancient Mayan ruins on the Caribbean side of Central America.

 

It is also a dream habitat for birds. Although Belize is Central America’s second-smallest country (roughly the size of Massachusetts), half of its land is covered with rainforests. More than a third of the land is under environmental protection, and it is the region’s least-populated country. No wonder it is home to more than 600 species of birds, from multiple kinds of trogons, motmots and puffbirds to the endemic Yellow-headed Parrot and the Jabiru stork, tallest bird in the Western Hemisphere. The species also include large numbers of North American warblers and flycatchers that overwinter in Belize.

 

Meet the birds of Belize and more through the eyes and photographs of Belizean bird guides Eduardo Ruano and Ruben Arevalo in DFO’s first evening program of 2026. “Birding former British Honduras? You’d better BELIZE It!” is set for Monday, January 26 at 7 p.m. MST via Zoom.

 

Ruano and Arevalo are longtime guides at Lamanai Outpost Lodge, one of several well-known destinations on the Belize birding tour circuit. Their home base has checklisted more than 400 bird species, and the lodge is a four-time winner of the H. Lee Jones Belize Bird-a-thon, an annual 24-hour competition named for the ornithologist-author of the Birds of Belize guidebook. It is also headquarters of a long-term University of Florida study of Morelet’s crocodile

 

Presentation topics range from the land and tree birds of Belize’s inland rainforests and pine savannas to shorebirds and waders of the Caribbean coastal region, where the Belize Barrier Reef of corals, mollusks and fish is part of the 700-mile Great Mayan Reef, second longest in the world. Nighttime boat safaris may reveal Yucatan nightjars and poorwills, and tropical forest walks cross paths with Great Curassows, Ocellated Turkeys, Red-lored Parrot and Collared Aracari, a kind of toucan.

Ruben Arevalo

Eduardo Ruano

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David Suddjian

DFO Communications and Outreach

Littleton CO