Pepe Manzanilla Photography

01/06/2026

Entre los bosques húmedos de las tierras bajas de Costa Rica se esconde uno de los carpinteros más hermosos del país: el Carpintero Castaño (Celeus castaneus).

Sus tonos cobrizos, caoba y rojizos parecen encenderse entre el verde de la selva, aunque a pocos metros puede desaparecer por completo entre las hojas y las sombras.

Habita principalmente desde el nivel del mar hasta unos 750 metros de altitud, donde cumple una labor silenciosa pero esencial para la salud del bosque. Al buscar insectos bajo la corteza de los árboles, ayuda a mantener el equilibrio natural y crea refugios que luego utilizan muchas otras especies.

A veces el bosque no necesita flores para mostrar sus colores.

A veces basta con un carpintero.

📍 Costa Rica
📸 Pepe Manzanilla Photography

BirdsOfCostaRica Woodpecker CeleusCastaneus NatureLovers ConservationPhotography PuraVida WildCostaRica Rainforest BirdWatching Photography

13/04/2026

In the stillness of the water, the turtles remain calm, watching the butterflies arrive like light thoughts, drawn by something invisible: minerals, moisture, life. They land without asking, as if they recognize in that shell a safe territory, a fragment of land that breathes.

For a moment beyond time, both exist in a perfect truce: a silent symbiosis where each takes what it needs without disturbing the other.

Beyond being an extraordinary moment, it is perhaps one of the purest forms of nature: coexistence.

Life is good 🐌… Pura vida!!

Hopefully this difficult moment in the world comes to an end soon, and peace 🕊️ finds its way back.

04/03/2026

Yesterday the world celebrated “World Wildlife Day” 🌿 🐆

I felt it was important to mention one of the great lords of our tropical jungle: The Jaguar.

The jaguar is not just an impressive animal.
It is the top predator of the jungle, the one that sits at the highest level of the food chain in an ecosystem that is still alive… still breathing.

When there are jaguars, the ecosystem is healthy.

Its beauty is impossible to ignore. Seeing one in the wild is truly unforgettable. But the jaguar represents more than natural beauty… it also carries deep historical and cultural meaning.

For thousands of years, Indigenous cultures across the Americas have seen the jaguar as a symbol of strength, power and a profound connection with nature.

Protecting the jaguar means protecting the balance of the forest… and honoring our cultural roots.

Life is good 🐌

Now more than ever…
🙏 May peace 🕊️ win this battle in our times.
No more violence.

21/02/2026

We flew to Patagonia to capture orcas launching onto the beach to hunt sea lion pups.
And we did.

But on the way, Patagonia gave us this —
a South American Gray Fox (Lycalopex griseus) feeding on a Magellanic Penguin (Spheniscus magellanicus).

Cold wind. Endless horizon. No audience. Just raw survival.

Two predators. One day. Edge of the world.

📍 Península Valdés
📷 Pepe Manzanilla

NatureUnfiltered PepeManzanilla

24/11/2025

Blue Hour Arrival – Ostional, Costa Rica 🐢💙

Blue hour, crepuscule time in Ostional: absolute humidity, salt in the air and a fine mist lifted by the waves. The sky was so heavy with clouds that it left just a tiny window of light on the horizon… through it, the sunbeams slipped in, cutting across the ocean and painting everything in this deep, unreal blue.

Along that perfect diagonal between the part of the beach already eaten away by the swell and the untouched sand, dozens of olive ridley sea turtles (Lepidochelys olivacea) were making their way in silence. They’re the smallest of all sea turtles, with shells around 60–80 cm and usually under 50 kg, but they cross entire oceans in the Pacific, Indian and Atlantic to return right here, to the same beach where they were born.

Ostional and Nancite, in Costa Rica, are two of the most important arribada beaches on the planet. Every female that comes ashore helps keep the ocean’s cycle alive… but they’re under threat from bycatch, pollution, beach loss and climate change.

Protecting them is also protecting our own future. 🌊🐢

Pura vida!!!
Life is good 🐌

19/11/2025

19/10/2025

Esta foto fue tomada en “Boca Tapada”, muy cerca del río San Juan, en la frontera con Nicaragua…

Aquí vemos a un kiskirís común (Pitangus sulphuratus), conocido también como pecho amarillo, en un momento natural y contundente: capturando a una rana de lluvia (Smilisca puma).

Así funciona la selva… sin juicios, sin dramatismos, solo con el equilibrio natural que ha mantenido la vida desde siempre. El ave, ágil y precisa, aprovecha cada oportunidad que la selva le da, mientras la rana cumple también su papel dentro del ciclo natural.

Un instante fugaz que nos recuerda que la naturaleza no es cruel ni compasiva: simplemente es…. 🌱

¡Pura vida!!!
Life is good 🐌…
Que la paz llegue pronto 🕊️

09/08/2025

En lo más profundo del bosque de Providencia de Dota en Costa Rica, donde la luz apenas se atreve a entrar, un coro silencioso de hongos dorados se alza sobre el tapiz verde del musgo, estos hongos no son sólo setas: son faroles diminutos en un templo verde, custodios de un pacto silencioso y milenario, entre la tenue luz, la oscuridad del enigmático micelio y la vida!! Life is good 🐌…

07/08/2025

Then I heard their scream
raw, unfiltered
cutting through the dawn
as the Tárcoles estuary held its breath.

First light glowed
on the white mangrove bark,
and the breeze, barely awake,
traced lines over the sea

But a scarlet macaw knows no silence.
Not the fury of its cry,
not the fire of its feathers,
not the way it splits the sky…

18/07/2025

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