This year’s Cloud Forest Workshop was a journey into the mist-draped mountains of western Panama, where elevation and isolation have created one of the most unique ecosystems on Earth. From resplendent quetzals and fiery-throated hummingbirds to newly described vipers coiled among heliconia, our days were spent immersed in the cool, saturated world of the highlands—where every ridge holds an endemic, and every cloud carries the forest’s breath.

In the coastal mangroves of Bocas del Toro, a prothonotary warbler (Protonotaria citrea) gleams like a flame in the shadows, feeding not on insects, but on fruit left behind by monkeys. Though known as insectivores during the breeding season, warblers across the tropics consume carotenoid-rich fruits: pigments that shape the bright yellows, oranges, and reds of their plumage. This tropical diet, often overlooked, may hold the key to their brilliant breeding colors. Far from mere winter refuge, the neotropics may serve as the nutritional crucible in which these birds are built, reframing warblers not as northern migrants with southern habits, but as tropical species whose lives are only partially visible when they return to sing.

Above the mirror of a boreal wetland, a red-necked grebe ferries its chick across still water—tucked between its wings, hidden in down. This isn’t just parenting; it’s evolution in motion. Vulnerable and newly hatched, grebe chicks ride for warmth, protection, and survival in a landscape shaped by cold and predators. From the eye-level stillness of a floating blind, this intimate behavior comes into view—quiet, fleeting, and impossible to witness from shore. In these flooded forests, where most life goes unseen, the blind becomes a portal to the subtle brilliance of adaptation.

In the lowland rainforests of Panama, Geoffroy’s tamarins slip like shadows through the mid-canopy, their masked faces and white crests glimpsed only in motion. But it’s their voices that give them away. High, clipped, and metallic, their calls echo the sharp notes of tyrant flycatchers, blurring the lines between primate and bird in a forest where sound carries farther than sight. This acoustic resemblance may reflect a deeper connection: flycatchers follow tamarin troops to catch flushed insects, while tamarins seem to respond to the birds’ alarm calls—a subtle, mutual choreography played out in the tangled understory.

When a brood of mallard ducklings drifted through the morning fog, the loons disappeared from the story—but something more intimate took shape. Seen from a floating blind, just inches above the surface, their world opened up: eye-level glimpses into the fragile physics that let them float, the maternal oil that coats their down, and the evolutionary design behind their soft, buoyant bodies.

In the misty cloud forests of Panama, brilliant flashes of color give way to aerial combat as tiny birds clash over a single bloom. In this behind-the-scenes look at photographing high-speed hummingbird battles with a multi-flash rig, wildlife photographer Jared Lloyd reveals the hidden aggression behind their iridescent beauty. From the mythology of Aztec gods to the physiology that fuels their fury, this article unpacks the science—and the spectacle—of why hummingbirds fight, and how capturing it on camera is both art and endurance.

Winter is here and with comes some of the best wildlife photography of the year, if only we know how animals respond to the changes in the air. We are working on something new here at PhotoWILD Magazine and Podcast, and excited to share a sneak peak inside!

Geoffroy’s tamarins, four species of kingfishers, toucans, iguanas, and snail kites galore, the second half of our trip spent several days with some truly spectacular wildlife photography opportunities in the interior of Panama.

Dispatchers from Panama. This years’ Wildlife of Panama workshop was a success. From shining honeycreepers to red-billed tropicbirds, white-faced capuchin monkeys to strawberry poison dart frogs, the first leg of the trip was concentrated along the Caribbean islands of Panama’s north coast where the landscape is dripping with biological diversity.

Photographing wildlife in fog can be one of the most challenging situation we come across in the field. But understanding the nature of fog and what it is necessary to overcome those challenges offers wildlife photographers unparalleled opportunities to create something magical.

As wildlife photographers, every day in the field presents its own grocery list of challenges for us to overcome. All too often, we find ourselves shying away from these challenges, opting instead for the easy low hanging fruit. But it's only when we embrace these challenges, when we embrace the suck, that we find ourselves being forced out of our tired and well worn ruts and begin to grow as artists and photographers.