Narrow-billed Woodcreeper
Lepidocolaptes angustirostris
Medium-sized woodcreeper with a bold head pattern and pale decurved bill. Found in open woodlands, wooded savannas, and agricultural lands with scattered trees where it forages on tree trunks and wooden fences, often with mixed-species flocks. Extensive plumage variation between subspecies but generally rufous above with paler underparts, a dark crown with a black mask, and a striking white eyebrow.
Identification
The narrow-billed woodcreeper is 18 to 22 cm (7.1 to 8.7 in) long; males weigh 23 to 37.5 g (0.81 to 1.3 oz) and females 21.5 to 33.5 g (0.76 to 1.2 oz). It is a slim, medium-sized woodcreeper with a long, slim, moderately decurved bill. The sexes have the same plumage. Adults of the nominate subspecies L. a. angustirostris have pale lores, a buffy white supercilium that widens to the rear and becomes a line of broken spots, and a black stripe behind the eye. Their crown and nape are blackish brown with whitish buff streaks. Their back and wing coverts are rufous brown with a faint olive tinge; some coverts have dusky outer webs and others olive. Their wings, rump, and tail are rufous-chestnut with browner outer webs and blackish tips on the primaries. Their throat and cheeks are plain whitish. Their breast and belly are buffy-white with dusky spots or streaks; the markings disappear on the lower belly and reappear on the undertail coverts. Their underwing coverts are rosy-cinnamon. Their iris is brown to chestnut, their bill pale gray to pinkish horn with dusky sides on the base of the mandible, and their legs and feet greenish gray to dark gray. Juveniles have darker upperparts than adults, with a more blackish head, more ochraceous supercilium and underparts, and more distinct streaks on the latter.<p>The subspecies of the narrow-billed woodcreeper differ mostly in the tone of their upper- and underparts and in how much streaking they have. They differ from the nominate and each other thus:
Taxonomy
The narrow-billed woodcreeper has these eight subspecies:<p>Several other subspecies have also been proposed as splits from the existing ones. All of the subspecies that adjoin each other intergrade, to the point where some authors have advocated treating the species as monotypic.
- Scientific name
- Lepidocolaptes angustirostris
- Authority
- (Vieillot, 1818)
- Order
- Passeriformes
- Family
- Furnariidae
- Genus
- Lepidocolaptes
Range and habitat
The subspecies of the narrow-billed woodcreeper are found thus. The boundaries between some subspecies are ill defined, especially that between L. a. angustirostris and L. a. praedatus.<p>The narrow-billed woodcreeper inhabits a variety of semi-open and open landscapes, mostly in the tropical zone but reaching the subtropics in the eastern Andean foothills. These include deciduous forest, Gran Chaco woodlands and scrublands, gallery forest, secondary forest, caatinga, cerrado, plantations, and open parts of populated areas. It is found less frequently in palm swamps. In most of its range it occurs from the lowlands to 1,200 m (3,900 ft); it reaches 3,000 m (9,800 ft) in Bolivia.
- Migration
- Resident species
Behavior
Migration pattern: Resident species.
Conservation
Population trend: rising.
- Population trend
- rising
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
Other Birds
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