Fiery-capped Manakin
Machaeropterus pyrocephalus
Small and brightly colored manakin most often found in terra firme and upland forests. Colorful male is nearly unmistakable, with its striking yellow and red crown, red-streaked underparts, and green wings. Mostly greenish female is much plainer and best identified by the faint shadow of streaking on the underparts and reddish legs. Generally an unobtrusive species, best found by its quiet and frustratingly hard to locate call, a short, high-pitched clear ‘pink’ given at regular intervals.
Taxonomy
- Scientific name
- Machaeropterus pyrocephalus
- Authority
- (Sclater, PL, 1852)
- Order
- Passeriformes
- Family
- Pipridae
- Genus
- Machaeropterus
Range and habitat
The fiery-capped manakin is found in the southern Amazon Basin of Brazil, southeast Peru, and northern Bolivia; also Venezuela. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forest.<p>Its range is in the south-central Amazon Basin, then spreads east–west, and is mostly associated with River drainages. The range, shaped like an inverted "Y" starts at the Amazon River outlet in southern Amapá state and Pará. At the Tapajós-Amazon River confluence, the range goes south, upstream on the Tapajós and forks east–west. The eastern range extends to the upstream third of the Xingu River, then further east to the upstream half of the Araguaia in the Araguaia-Tocantins River system. The range narrows eastward another 600 km at the very headwaters of the adjacent Tocantins River.<p>The westward extension of the range covers northern Amazonian Bolivia, the tributary headwaters to the northeast-flowing Madeira River; the range continues through southeast and central Amazonian Peru beyond the north-flowing Amazon River tributary, the Ucayali River.<p>Two small disjunct populations of the fiery-capped manakin occur; one in northeast Roraima state on the south-flowing Branco River; the other further northwest on the lower reaches of the Caribbean-flowing Orinoco River in east-central Venezuela, 500 km upstream.
- Migration
- Resident species
Conservation
- Population trend
- declining
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
Other Birds
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Gray-hooded Parrotbill
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Sumichrast's Wren
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Very local in humid evergreen forest of limestone (karst) lowlands and foothills in northern Oaxaca and adjacent Veracruz; endemic. Stays on or near the ground, moving quickly among limestone boulders, popping in and out of caves and crevices. Like most wrens, heard more often than seen, but can be curious; sometimes appears at close range, bobbing and holding its tail cocked. Distinctive: rather chunky with a very long bill, a pale gray face marked with a dark cheek patch, and a rusty breast.
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