Rara avis

Last year, while I was in Oaxaca, I went on a birding trip with a local guide.  Roque is a professional guide and a Zapotec Indian.  There is no tiny corner of Oaxaca state that Roque doesn't know, nor what birds are there.
On this trip, we went into the southern open country where neat farms and rancheros are scattered and the occasional village pops up.  The villages for the most part are very clean, with the streets either paved or swept, painted houses and usually Christmas lights festooned around the small town square, or zocolo.   Christmas decorations in Mexico stay up through January at least.
We were on the hunt for a very rare little bird, the Sumichrast's Wren.  In the past,  birds got named this way to honor the person who discovered them, or someone that the discoverer wanted to honor.  Dr. Sumichrast named a bunting that he discovered, Rosita's bunting, after his wife.  That would be some honor in my book!  Rosita's bunting is possibly the most beautiful bird I've ever seen, but more about that later.
Sumichrast's wren has a very, very restricted habitat.  They live in limestone outcroppings that have overgrown with dense tropical forest.  There is only a very tiny area of Oaxaca state where these are found. These limestone outcroppings can be acres square, or fairly small.  With agriculture pushing in, the outcroppings appear on the horizon as tall, broad whitish grey lumps covered in green vines and trees.  They aren't easy to navigate, as they're full of holes, as limestone tends to be.  Dense undercover and deep shade add to the challenge.  And this is a very shy little bird.  If a wren hears a party of humans approaching, no more wren.
So we tiptoed as well as we could, slowly, slowly into a very rocky open space in the understory.  All around us were limestone shelves, pits, rocks, you name it.  Roque held his finger to his lips to indicate absolute silence.  We got comfortable as possible, as we were asked to not even move or speak.   So we stood.  And stood.  Roque played a recording of a male Sumicrast's call.  Played it again.  And again. Male birds hear these tapes of their songs as threats to their proscribed territory.  When a male hears another bird (or tape) he will emerge, usually agitated, and begin to search for the intruder. Meanwhile, the birders get good looks at the bird. There are lots of discussions about the ethics of playing tapes and agitating the birds.  This bird would probably be located one to two times in a year, by an excellent guide like Roque, so he wouldn't be overly disturbed.  But I do recognize this as situational ethics.
So, we stood there for probably 30 minutes with absolute silence surrounding us.  Roque decided to play the call one more time.   He had told us that if he saw a wren, or if we did, to move very little and say nothing.  Suddenly his eyes lit up and one finger moved a bare 1/2 inch to point out the bird.

He was peering out of  a hole in a limestone shelf about 10 feet away.  He was responding to the taped call.
This is dark little wren with dark eyes.  Most wrens are sort of dun-colored and there are wrens in Mexico that are off-white with lovely dark striping.  This little guy totally blended into his dark surroundings.  And about the time I got my eyes focused on him, off he flitted, to appear higher up on the shelf, still looking for that other male.  He circled us a time or two, landed quite close on  the ground, then was evidently satisfied that the threat was over.  We didn't see him again.
We all let out a collective breath of admiration and happiness.  What a great bird.  What a mysterious and almost magical place to live.
I silently wished him well and thanked him in my heart for his gift to us.   We staggered out of the dark, viney, pockmarked limestone into the hot, harsh light of the afternoon. We were done for the day -  nothing could surpass the Sumichrast's wren.