Andean Potoo
Nyctibius maculosus
Rare night bird found in high elevation Andean cloud forest. Cryptically patterned in brown and buff with white patches in the wings. Usually seen perching vertically on the tip of an exposed branch or snag. Sometimes encountered roosting or nesting during the day and may return to the same location over the course of months or even years. At night, it is usually detected by seeing its eyeshine in the beam of a light or by hearing its song—a short howl given at long intervals.
Identification
The Andean potoo is 34 to 40.5 cm (13 to 16 in) long. One male weighed 195 g (6.9 oz) and two females 145 and 185 g (5.1 and 6.5 oz). The male's upperparts are brown with white, buff, tawny, and black streaks, speckles, and spots. The median wing coverts are white and show as a broad strip on the closed wing. The chin and throat are white or grayish white with a cinnamon wash on the lower throat. The breast is brown with a buff or tawny band separating it from the buffish upper belly and flanks. The breast has blackish brown speckles and the belly and flanks have brown bars and vermiculation. The lower belly is pale buff, cinnamon buff, or whitish and has blackish brown streaks and spots. The female is lighter overall, with more of a buffy or tawny background color, and the wing coverts are buff, not white.
Taxonomy
For a time the Andean potoo was considered a subspecies of the white-winged potoo (Nyctibius leucopterus), but size, plumage, voice, and elevational distribution differentiate them. Those two species, the northern potoo (N. jamaicensis), and the common potoo (N. griseus) are more closely related to each other than to the other potoos. The Andean potoo is monotypic.
- Scientific name
- Nyctibius maculosus
- Authority
- Ridgway, 1912
- Order
- Caprimulgiformes
- Family
- Nyctibiidae
- Genus
- Nyctibius
Range and habitat
The Andean potoo is known from about a dozen sites along the Andean chain from western Venezuela through Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru into western Bolivia. "This patchy distribution may reflect a truly local distribution, or may reflect the difficulties of detecting a cryptically colored, nocturnal bird in sites with few resident ornithologists." In elevation it mostly ranges between about 1,800 and 2,800 m (5,900 and 9,200 ft); the lowest elevation recorded is 1,400 m (4,600 ft) and the highest 3,200 m (10,500 ft). It inhabits the canopy of the interior and edges of humid montane forest.
- Migration
- Resident species
Behavior
The Andean potoo is nocturnal. It captures its insect prey by sallying from an exposed perch, but the details of its diet remain unknown.<p>The Andean potoo roosts during the day on large branches, including those that project above the canopy.<p>The Andean potoo's breeding phenology is unknown. It is assumed to lay one egg on a branch in the canopy in a manner similar to that of other potoos.<p>The Andean potoo's song is "an almost queulous wailing shriek, kwaaaanh, given at intervals of 3-5 seconds". It also produces "a slow, hollow wok wok wok" and "a quieter bu bu bu calls."
Conservation
- Population trend
- declining
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
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