Maquis Canastero
Asthenes heterura
Slender and long-tailed canastero of the high Andes from Cochabamba, Bolivia south to NE Argentina. Prefers scrubby hillsides, ravines, and open Polylepis woodland above treeline. Distinguished from the more common Puna and Creamy-breasted Canasteros by lack of streaked back (from Puna) and brown cap and long, slender tail (from Creamy-breasted). Often in pairs or small family groups, though can be quite elusive. Song a rising series of slightly nasal whistles, each of which descends and the ascends rapidly in pitch: “tuwhee-tuwee-tuwhee-tuweeh-tee!”
Identification
The maquis canastero is 16 to 17 cm (6.3 to 6.7 in) long and weighs 13 to 14 g (0.46 to 0.49 oz). The sexes have the same plumage. Adults have a buff supercilium and eyering on an otherwise light brownish face. Their crown, back, and rump are rich brown and their uppertail coverts chestnut. Their wings are mostly rufous with dark fuscous tips on the flight feathers. Their tail's inner two pairs of feathers are longer than the others and dusky rufous; the rest are chestnut-rufous and progressively shorter. Their chin and upper throat are pale orange-rufous, their breast and belly grayish buff with browner sides, and their flanks and undertail coverts tawny ochraceous. Their iris is brown, their maxilla black, their mandible pinkish with a black tip, and their legs and feet dark gray to dark olive-gray.
Taxonomy
The maquis canastero is monotypic. At times it has variously been treated as a subspecies of the canyon canastero (A. pudibunda), as conspecific with the rusty-fronted canastero (A. ottonis), and as a superspecies with the two of them. However, it might be most closely related to the very similar sharp-billed canastero (A. pyrrholeuca).
- Scientific name
- Asthenes heterura
- Authority
- (Berlepsch, 1901)
- Order
- Passeriformes
- Family
- Furnariidae
- Genus
- Asthenes
Range and habitat
The maquis canastero is a bird of the east side of the Andes, though sources differ on the extent of its range. According to the International Ornithological Committee (IOC) and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, it is present in Bolivia and Argentina. It has an apparently disjunct distribution and it may also be present between the two known populations. One population is found in the northern Bolivian departments of La Paz and Cochabamba. The other is found in the northwestern Argentinian provinces of Jujuy, Salta, and Tucumán. There are sight records from the Bolivian departments between the two areas. In contrast, the Clements taxonomy lists only the northern Bolivian range.<p>The maquis canstero inhabits a variety of semi-humid to arid landscapes including montane scrublands, scrublands with open woodland of Alnus and Polylepis, montane Festuca grasslands with scattered bushes, and agricultural areas with bushes and hedgerows. In elevation it mostly ranges between 3,000 and 4,200 m (9,800 and 13,800 ft) though it locally occurs as low as 2,500 m (8,200 ft).
- Migration
- Resident species
Behavior
The maquis canastero is a year-round resident throughout its range.<p>The maquis canastero feeds on arthropods. It typically forages singly or in pairs though it occasionally joins mixed-species feeding flocks. It gleans its prey from the ground and possibly from low vegetation as well.<p>Nothing is known about the maquis canastero's breeding biology.<p>The maquis canastero's song is "a fast, accelerating series of squeaky notes". It also sings a longer "series of high, squeaky, strained notes, variable in length, accelerating and descending". Its apparent call is a "monotonic trill...'tuírrrr' ".
Conservation
- Population trend
- declining
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
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