Dusky-capped Woodcreeper
Lepidocolaptes fuscicapillus
Small, slender woodcreeper with a pale curved bill. Heavy white streaking on underparts, but has unstreaked rufous upperparts. Found in humid lowland forests and old second growth, where it forages in the canopy and usually associates with mixed-species flocks. Gives its presence away by its far-carrying song, a descending series of notes: “ti, ti, ti-ti-tee-tee-teh-teh-tutututututu.” Widespread in southern Amazonia, mainly in Brazil and eastern Bolivia.
Identification
The dusky-capped woodcreeper weighs about 22 to 28 g (0.78 to 0.99 oz). It is a smallish, slim, woodcreeper with a slim decurved bill. The sexes have the same plumage. Adults' crown and nape are grayish brown becoming warm brown on the back. Their wings, uppertail coverts, rump, and tail are brown with a rufous tinge. Their chin and throat are whitish to buffy-white. Their underparts are brown with blackish-edged whitish streaks. Their underwing coverts are rufous-brown. Their iris is dark brown, their bill pale brown with a pinkish tinge and a darker tip on the mandible, and the legs and feet usually blackish slate or grayish. Juveniles are similar to adults with the largest difference being their shorter, straighter, and yellowish bill.
Taxonomy
Until the 2010s what is now the dusky-capped woodcreeper was considered a subspecies of Lepidocolaptes albolineatus, which was then called the lineated woodcreeper. Starting at that time all but the lineated's nominate subspecies were split from it, eventually resulting in the dusky-capped woodcreeper, the Duida woodcreeper (L. duidae), the Inambari woodcreeper (L. fatimalimae), and a monotypic L. albolineatus which was renamed the Guianan woodcreeper. In the initial split, two subspecies of the lineated woodcreeper, L. a. fuscicapillus and L. a. layardi, were each accorded species status as the "Rondonia" and "Layard's" woodcreepers respectively. In 2020 the two were lumped as the two subspecies of the current dusky-capped woodcreeper.
- Scientific name
- Lepidocolaptes fuscicapillus
- Authority
- (Pelzeln, 1868)
- Order
- Passeriformes
- Family
- Furnariidae
- Genus
- Lepidocolaptes
Range and habitat
The nominate subspecies L. f. fuscicapillus of the dusky-capped woodcreeper is found in the Amazon Basin of northeastern Bolivia and western Brazil, south of the Amazon River in the interfluve of the Madeira and Tapajós rivers. Subspecies L. f. layardi is found south of the Amazon east of the Tapajós. The species mostly inhabits terra firme and floodplain forest. It favors the interior and edges of tall primary forest and mature secondary forest. It is found less often in savanna, and is found only rarely in young secondary forest. It elevation it seldom exceeds 700 m (2,300 ft).
- Migration
- Resident species
Behavior
Migration pattern: Resident species.
Conservation
Population trend: declining.
- Population trend
- declining
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
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