| |
|
Palo Verde
National Park
This national park is made up of a mosaic
of diverse floodplain habitats, bordered by
rivers and a ridge of limestone hills. The
Palo Verde area is subject to seasonal floods
of great magnitude due to its lack of natural
drainage. This produces a greater ecological
diversity-between 12 and 15 habitats have
been identified.
These
habitats include salt and fresh water lakes
and swamps, grasslands with black mangroves,
mangrove swamps, pastures, lowland stunted
forests, wooded savannas and evergreen forests.
The most conspicuous species and the one from
which the park takes its name is the "palo
verde" or horse bean, a leafy bush with
its branches and parts of its trunk colored
light green. The hills are home to an endemic
species of cactus. The lignum-vitae, a tree
prized for its wood and in imminent danger
of extinction, is also found here.
Palo
Verde's natural water system has created an
environment capable of supporting one of the
largest concentrations of waterfowl and wading
birds, both native and migratory, in the country
and, in fact, in all of Central America. The
forests are the nesting grounds of the endangered
jabiru and home to the only colony of scarlet
macaws in the Dry Pacific.
Some
of the most abundant mammals are the howler
and white-faced monkeys, white-nosed coati,
white-tailed deer, tree squirrel and porcupine.
Crocodiles up to five meters long have been
sighted in the Tempisque River. |
| |
|
|
|
|
Surfing
Snorkeling
