A pretty picture on an Altamira Oriole merely hinting of what it was like appears at the top of this page.

from the November 29, 2009 Newsletter issued from Hacienda Chichen Resort beside Chichén Itzá Ruins, central Yucatán, MÉXICO
ORIOLE IN THE BAR
The Hacienda offers wireless internet but the signal doesn't reach my place. Therefore each morning I pack up my laptop and head for the bar, which also is the computer room. Tuesday morning when I entered, the guys were standing around looking at the ceiling. An oriole had entered and didn't know how to get out. You can see him on a rafter right beneath the ceiling above.

That's an Altamira Oriole, ICTERUS GULARIS, a permanent resident from the southern tip of Texas through Mexico's eastern and southern lowlands, south to Nicaragua. They're common here and often you hear their bright chiu calls and other songs. This one called a few times while he was trying to escape, the feeling of being upset easy to hear in his voice.

At http://www.backyardnature.net/yucatan/orioles.htm I list and talk about the northern Yucatan's six oriole species. Because the orioles' female, juvenile and first-year plumages are often similar among the species, in the field it can be hard to impossible to identify certain individuals to species level. Usually adult males are easy to distinguish, though. Still, our Hooded Orioles, also common here, look a lot like Altamiras.

The Hooded is a little smaller, has a decurved upper bill, and the large wing patch where the wing bends -- the upper wingbar -- is white, while you can see that the Altamira's is orange. In the field I find the first two field marks hard to use, so usually it comes down to hoping I have an adult male to look at and, if so, checking to see if the upper wingbar is white or orange.

This is another bird who favors semiopen and disturbed areas, which accounts for it common occurrence.

from the January 22, 2012 Newsletter issued from Hacienda Chichen Resort beside Chichén Itzá Ruins, central Yucatán, MÉXICO
HUNGRY BIRDS
Last Monday morning, everything seemed hungry, and I'm not sure why. Maybe it was because it was such a perfect, moist, warm, springy morning (despite all the dry-season-falling leaves) that many organisms, including myself, just felt like gorging on everything.

For example, in a leafless, super-prolifically fruiting Cow-Itch tree (Urera baccifera) an Altamira Oriole took his time stuffing himself with BB-size fruits, as shown below:

Another Altamira Oriole perched atop the highest bouquet of a flowering African Tulip Tree dipping his beak into pooled water or maybe preying on flower bugs, the blossoms' yellow-orangeness perfectly complementing the oriole's bright plumage, as seen below: