Ochre-breasted Foliage-gleaner
Anabacerthia lichtensteini
Medium-sized foliage-gleaner with a short bill and attractive head pattern giving it a “cute” look. The crown and mask are gray-brown contrasting with a buffy-yellow eyebrow and throat. Buffy and unstreaked below and rufous-brown above. Found in the upper levels of forests and second growth. The song is a short fast trill.
Identification
The ochre-breasted foliage-gleaner is 15 to 17 cm (5.9 to 6.7 in) long and weighs 18 to 24 g (0.63 to 0.85 oz). It is a medium-sized furnariid with a wedge-shaped bill that is the shortest in its genus. The sexes have the same plumage. Adults have an ochraceous eye ring and sharply defined supercilium, a dark brownish band behind the eye, dull rufous-ochre ear coverts, and pale brownish lores. Their crown is dull gray-brown with vague paler streaks, their back rufescent brown, and their rump and uppertail coverts a slightly lighter rufescent brown. Their tail is mostly rufous with rufescent brown outer webs on the innermost pair of feathers. Their wings are rufous brown with duskier tips on the flight feathers. Their throat and malar area are bright ochraceous buff, their upper breast a richer ocraceous buff, and the rest of their underparts a duller ocraceous buff. Their iris is brown, their maxilla brownish gray, their mandible light gray, and their legs and feet greenish gray. Juveniles have less uniformly colored underparts than adults, and those feathers have grayish tips.
Taxonomy
The ochre-breasted foliage-gleaner was previously included in genus Philydor but a 2011 paper made it plain that it did not belong there. The same paper found the white-browed foliage-gleaner (A. amaurotis) and the ochre-breasted to be sister species.<p>The ochre-breasted foliage gleaner is monotypic.
- Scientific name
- Anabacerthia lichtensteini
- Authority
- (Cabanis & Heine, 1860)
- Order
- Passeriformes
- Family
- Furnariidae
- Genus
- Anabacerthia
Range and habitat
The ochre-breasted foliage-gleaner is found in southeastern Brazil from Bahia, Goiás, and Mato Grosso do Sul south into Rio Grande do Sul, in eastern Paraguay, and in northeastern Argentina's Misiones Province. It inhabits montane evergreen forest and tall secondary forest. In elevation it ranges from sea level to 800 m (2,600 ft).
- Migration
- Resident species
Behavior
The ochre-breasted foliage-gleaner is a year-round resident throughout its range.<p>The ochre-breasted foliage-gleaner feeds on arthropods. It usually forages as part of mixed-species feeding flocks, and usually from the forest's mid-storey to its canopy. It acrobatically gleans and pulls for its prey in dead leaves, debris, and branches.<p>Nothing is known about the ochre-breasted foliage-gleaner's breeding biology.<p>The ochre-breasted foliage-gleaner's song is a "series of up to 10 estr. high, piercing 'zipzip---' notes". Its call is a "short, very high, inhaled trill".
Conservation
- Population trend
- declining
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
Other Birds
Palani Laughingthrush
Montecincla fairbanki
This is the only montane laughingthrush in its range and hence unmistakable. It has dull olive-brown upperparts, a grey-streaked white breast, and a rufous-chestnut lower breast and belly. The most striking characteristic is the white eyebrow, flaring in front of the eye over a dark eye-line. Found in stunted montane forests, tea estates, and wooded second growth, in pairs or noisy flocks, producing a melodious “pe-kee-ke” song and several other chatters intermingled with musical notes. Heard more often than seen; its songs and calls are usually the first indication of its presence.
Purplish Jacamar
Galbula chalcothorax
Slender, long-billed rainforest bird. Mostly ranges in lowlands, but reaches the foothills of the eastern Andes in a few areas. Plumage color varies among individuals. Body ranges from deep coppery-chestnut to glittering golden-green (with only a tinge of chestnut). Head coloration ranges from blue to glittering greenish-blue. Throat stripe is white in male and buffy in female. Typically seen perched fairly high in the forest, occasionally sallying out to catch a passing insect.
Pacific Loon
Gavia pacifica
A medium-sized loon, common in western North America and across the Pacific to Japan. Dark overall and relatively short-billed for a loon, with a rounded crown and nape. Breeding plumage striking with gray head, white-checkered back, and thin white lines on sides of neck. Nonbreeding plumage is rather dark gray above with a clearly demarcated white throat and even border between gray and white on the neck. Diagnostic dark “chinstrap” is sometimes obvious but can be difficult to see at a distance, and is often absent on first-year birds. Especially similar to Arctic Loon, which overlaps mainly from Alaska to Japan. Pacific is subtly smaller-billed and usually holds its head horizontally. In breeding plumage, Pacific has a paler nape that shines silvery in the sunlight, and thinner white lines on the neck than Arctic. Breeds on lakes and ponds in the tundra. Winters mainly on nearshore ocean waters, sometimes in sheltered bays. Often in loose groups, especially where food is plentiful; sometimes mixes with other loon species. Rare but regular on inland reservoirs and lakes during migration and winter.
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