January 29, 2015, Cuiaba, Brazil — Strategically, this year is a delicate balance between logistics and birding: Ideally, I will spend just long enough in each place to see a bunch of birds before moving onward. I planned most of my itinerary in advance, which involved a lot of research and some guesswork. So far, I’m doing pretty well; I’m ahead of the 14-new-birds-a-day pace I need to maintain to reach 5,000—though it will get harder as the easy ones are checked off. 2903 Early this morning, Rene and I visited a superb hummingbird feeder setup near Ubatuba. It’s maintained by a man named Jonas who said his hummers consume two to ten pounds of sugar each day (plus water). We saw nine species at the feeders, including emeralds, rubies, sapphires, coquettes, mangos, hermits, woodnymphs, and jacobins - hummingbirds have great names! Then we just had time to spend a few minutes in the nearby forest before making the four-hour drive back to Sao Paulo so I could catch my...