Your birding experience greatly depends on the water levels of the lagoons. In good years (with plenty of water), you should find Wattled Jacana, Rufescent Tiger-Heron, Whistling Heron, White-faced and Fulvous Whistling-Ducks, Coscoroba and Black-necked Swans, Silver Teal, Speckled Teal, Rosy-billed Pochard and Lake Duck. Look hard for Black-headed Duck, one of the specialties, and check the black blobs to differentiate the three species of coot that can also be seen in one day – Red-gartered, Red-fronted and White-winged.

Some summer migrants are Dark-billed Cuckoo, hummers like Glittering-bellied Emerald and Gilded Sapphire, Vermilion Flycatcher, Tropical Kingbird, Fork-tailed Flycatcher, Streaked Flycatcher, White-winged Becard, Brown-chested Martin and White-rumped Swallow. The latter hirundine is replaced by Chilean Swallow in winter time, which is also an interesting season for birding as many other visitors arrive namely Bar-winged Cinclodes, Lesser Canastero, Dark-faced Ground-Tyrant, Grey-crowned Tyrannulet and White-tipped Plantcutter.

Contrasting views of extensive pampas grass fields against the modern skyscrapers of Puerto Madero, the newest neighbourhood of the city, are typical as one approaches the Plata River. Some coastal birds to look for here include Great Grebe, Kelp, Brown-hooded and Grey-hooded Gulls. In some winters we get the threatened Olrog’s Gull too. Very wet seasons were spectacular years for shorebirds. We often have Black Skimmer, Rufous-chested Dotterel, American Golden-Plover, Collared and Two-banded Plovers, South-American Painted Snipe, Lesser and Greater Yellowlegs, Solitary Sandpiper, Red Knot, White-rumped, Pectoral and Stilt Sandpipers, South American Snipe, Hudsonian Godwit and Wilson’s Phalarope.