Most guests arrive hoping to see a sloth. Many go home talking about something else: the capuchins that came right up to the tables, or the howlers they heard long before they saw them. Watching wildlife well in Manuel Antonio comes down to patience and a few simple habits. They are the difference between watching animals live their lives and getting in their way.
Who Lives Here, and Why Nothing Is Guaranteed
Manuel Antonio has three kinds of monkeys: the small squirrel monkey (the tití), the white-faced capuchin and the mantled howler. Add two kinds of sloths, coatis, raccoons, iguanas, toucans and scarlet macaws, and SINAC counts about 352 bird species in the national park alone. Our wildlife guide introduces them one by one. Some mornings you see a lot before breakfast. Some mornings you see leaves.
Animals move with the weather, the season and the hour. No hotel, guide or tour can promise a sighting. Be wary of anyone who promises you a specific animal.
Treat each sighting as luck, not a box to tick. Guests who slow down and sit still usually see more than guests who walk fast looking for one animal.
The Golden Rule: Never Feed the Animals
Feeding wild animals is prohibited in the national park, and SINAC explains why: certain foods can seriously affect their health and change their behavior. Monkeys that link people with food start grabbing bags and raiding tables. Our monkey guide explains it in more detail.
At ECOTICA, the capuchins are the ones to watch. They come in big family groups, get very close and go straight for sugar. Sugar is bad for them, so we keep it out of their reach and ask guests to do the same. Once, one of them sat down in a guest’s seat at YOLO Social and drank her water with the straw. Here is the whole capuchin story.
Keep sugar, fruit and drinks close when monkeys are around. If a capuchin comes to your table, step back and let our staff handle it. Don’t reach for it or chase it.
How Close Is Too Close
A useful test: if the animal stops eating, changes direction or looks straight at you, you are too close. Step back and it usually settles.
Turn the flash off. It startles animals, especially at night, and natural light photos look better anyway.
Skip the selfie with an animal. Costa Rican rules prohibit direct contact with wild animals, and SINAC asks visitors not to touch them.
Keep your voice low. Quiet groups hear more, from a rustle in the canopy to the call of a toucan. Any good guide on our wildlife and nature tours will ask the same of you.
Best Hours to Look
Early morning is the liveliest time for many animals. Squirrel monkeys start foraging shortly before sunrise, and birds are busiest before the heat. Several pairs of scarlet macaws nest in two tall royal palms on our property, and early morning, around breakfast, is when they fly around looking for food. Here is the story of their nests.
Late afternoon brings a second round as the heat drops. Toucans get more active toward sunset. At ECOTICA, the YOLO Social deck at sunset works like a monkey observatory: monkeys often pass along the tree corridor they use to cross the property. Sloths move slowly, so scan the same tree twice.
Midday is quiet. Good time for the pool or a treatment at the Jungle Spa. Bad time to hike looking for monkeys.
Rain on this coast tends to come in the afternoon, and many animals go quiet in a downpour. One more reason to start early.
Going With a Guide, and Going on Your Own
A naturalist guide carries a spotting scope. That scope is the difference between a brown lump in a guarumo tree and the face of a sloth. It also keeps the group standing still on the path instead of pushing closer for a better look.
Ask a guide how they handle close encounters before you book. The good ones will tell you straight away that they never call, feed or bait animals to bring them in. If the answer is vague, keep asking.
Our concierge can arrange a guided walk in the national park, and there is no pressure to book anything. Plenty of guests spend a morning on our ten acres of rainforest with a pair of binoculars and come back with a list. If you would rather have someone else do the spotting, start with our wildlife and nature tours. For tickets and rules, read our national park guide: the park opens Wednesday to Monday, 7:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., and is closed on Tuesdays.
Bring binoculars if you own them. They are the most useful thing you can pack for watching wildlife, and the best tool for leaving animals alone while you do it.
Small Habits That Help the Forest
- Carry out what you carry in, fruit peels included. Scraps left on a trail teach animals to search wherever people walk.
- Leave shells and snails on the beach. SINAC asks visitors not to collect them.
- Drive slowly on the road between Quepos and Manuel Antonio. Look up at the rope bridges over it: they are there because monkeys and sloths cross here.
- Stay on marked trails inside the national park. The undergrowth beside the path is habitat, not extra walking space.
- If an animal looks hurt, don’t pick it up. Keep people back and tell a park ranger, your guide or our front desk.
Watch From Where You Sleep
ECOTICA sits on about ten acres of rainforest a few minutes from Manuel Antonio National Park. Howler monkeys, sloths, toucans, scarlet macaws and butterflies are part of daily life here, though never on a schedule. The howlers stay high in the trees, and you usually hear them before you see them.
Sometimes the animals come to us. One rainy day an adult sloth made its way under the tables at YOLO Social, and Lisa, one of our owners, helped carry it back to a big tree. Here is how that went.
There are private bungalows for two, suites for up to four and a Grand Master Suite for six, so couples and families both find room. Breakfast starts at 6:00 a.m., early enough for the macaws, and the Jungle Spa sits right off the pool, facing the forest, for the hot middle of the day.
Write to us before you come with questions about guides, transport or which room suits your group. We like answering them. When you are ready, check availability and rates and book direct with us.
