The Magnolia Cloud Forest Preserve is a family-run business. In this case the family is Mario Perez, guide extraordinairre, Lara Putnam, who handles reservations, and the Perez-Putnam children, Miriam, Gabriel, and Alonso, in charge of picking blackberries and chasing lizards.
This is one of the many creatures we have at the Magnolia Cloud Forest. It is a small lizard that stopped by for a visit while we were working on one of our maintenance projects. As you can see, the little creature has had hard times elsewhere, as evident with the lower part of it's tail missing. In time, it will grow back to a normal tail.
Photo Courtesy of Chaya Spector
Another creature you may find wandering around Magnolia Cloud Forest. Do you know what this is?
Because our private reserve receives restricted numbers of visitors, it is protected from the poaching of wild species that occurs elsewhere. This wild orchid burst into bloom on a tree trunk right alongside one of our hiking trails.
The native oak [Quercus costaricensis] forests of the southern Cordillera central mountains have been rapidly shrinking over the past seventy years, as hard-pressed farmers moving into the region have felled the towering trees to turn them into charcoal. Where they still stand untouched, the oaks are the anchors of the complex cloud forest ecosystem. Their trunks are covered in mosses, ferns, and epiphytes, while their branches are dotted with bromeliads of every size. About one-third of the land held by the Magnolia Cloud Forest Preserve was deforested in this way by the former owners, a local family who now work with us maintaining trails and guiding our all-day hikes to the Tapanti Reserve. Over the eight years since we purchased the property, the forest has begun to reclaim the deforested area, but it will take many decades before it regains the density of plant life shown here. This is a view of our primary cloud forest, the forest which has never been touched by human pressures.
This "mirador," or lookout point, is the ideal location for bird watching. It is located amid small trees and blackberry bushes on one of the open slopes where the cloud forest is regenerating. To the north from this spot stretches a panoramic view across the Cartago Valley.
From our mirador, you can gaze across the valley of Cartago toward the Irazu volcano in the distance. The view at night is stunning, with the lights of the city far, far below, and an astonishing array of stars in the sky above you.
The curved tube of this wild flower is typical of many flowers here whose shape and coloration are adapted to attract hummingbirds, who pollinate the flowers as they move from one to the next, drinking nectar. Hummingbird species abound here, ranging in size from smaller than your thumbnail to larger than your hand.


Photo Courtesy of Chaya Spector

A new fern leaf taking it's place in the Rain Forest
Huge white hydrangeas, or "hortensias" as they are called in Costa Rica, grow wild all over the mountain top.

At 7000 feet above sea level, you will find you may need a sweatshirt and sunscreen at the same time.