Garden Emerald

How to find it

Choose open, sunny places rather than forest: garden clearings, hedges and flowering borders. A local guide regularly finds it at a hedge of rabo de gato (Stachytarpheta) near San Rafael de Pavones, on the Turrialba to Siquirres road, and the hedge draws the birds. Heliconia gardens in the southern zone also attract it. Around Turrialba it is the only emerald a visitor there is likely to see. Expect larger hummingbirds to chase it, so give the flowers a few patient minutes.

How to recognise it

The male is only about 8 cm long. Look for:

- bronze-green upperparts

- bright green underparts

- white thighs

- a deeply forked tail

At first look he is simply glittering green.

The female looks so different that a casual observer may take her for another species. She has grey underparts, a white stripe behind the eye and dusky ear patches. Her tail is not deeply forked and has white tips. The white stripe often shows well, which separates her from the female Snowcap, widespread and common in parts of the Turrialba area.

What it sounds like

Recording: Maria Janeiro, CC BY 4.0, source, read 4 Nov 2026.

Behaviour and diet

The Garden Emerald visits small flowers, including ones other hummingbirds ignore, and it also takes tiny insects. Larger hummingbirds often chase it away, so watch the edges of a flowering patch rather than the best blooms.

Breeding males perch on open branches and may perform a dive display, which makes an exposed sunny perch a good place to scan.

Where it lives

It lives in open country: forest edges, hedgerows, streamside thickets, scrub and gardens. In Costa Rica it ranges from sea level up to 1,500 m, though it is mostly recorded in coastal lowlands and foothills. A Costa Rica birding guide lists it among the hummingbirds of mid-elevation gardens, at roughly 800 to 1,200 m.

It lives in the southwest, including the Térraba Valley and the Dota Mountains, as a resident of the southern Pacific slope. It is also reported around Turrialba on the Caribbean slope.

When to see it

A nest with two feathered chicks was found on 28 March 2009 at La Amistad International Park, and the chicks fledged by 18 April. In Panama breeding appears to run from at least November to March.

Similar birds

It resembles Canivet's Emerald (Chlorostilbon canivetii), but has a less forked tail and a duller crown. Birds along the Pacific coast between Carara and Palmar look intermediate between the two species. Elsewhere their ranges are said not to overlap.

Names and lore in Costa Rica

Costa Rican Spanish names include Esmeralda Jardinera and Esmeralda Jardinero. Wider Spanish names include Esmeralda de Panamá and Esmeralda Afín.

Status and conservation

The AOCR list marks it R-END, a resident endemic, and the IUCN lists it as Least Concern.

Photography tips

Set up at a sunny hedge of flowering Stachytarpheta or a heliconia garden and wait. Males perch on open branches, so an exposed perch near the flowers is a good place to focus.