Spotted Forktail

Small streaked antwren of riparian habitats. Males are white with black streaking; females are similar but with an extensive reddish wash. Tail very short in both sexes. Usually found in waterside vegetation around still or slow-moving water bodies like streams and lakes, where it forages low in vegetation overhanging the water. Gives two main songs: an even-pitched, accelerating trill of musical notes, and a slow ascending-descending series of whistled notes. The latter is one of the most characteristic bird sounds around oxbow lakes in Amazonia.

Scarce and often rather local hawk of temperate rainforest and edge, adjacent open and semiopen areas. Looks similar to the Red-tailed Hawk of North America. Hunts from perches, less often in flight. Light morph has dark leading edge to underwing; adult has diagnostic rusty tail with narrow dark bars. Rare dark morph has dark body plumage, adult tail washed grayish; immature has broader, blunter wings than very similar dark-morph immature of Variable Hawk.

Small antshrike found in the lower and middle levels of dry forests and at the edge of humid forests. Males are gray overall with a black crown, and white-spotted black wings and tail. Females have a rusty crown, back, and tail, are buff below with white spots on the wings. The song is a loud and long series of around 20 descending notes that accelerate in pace. Doesn’t overlap in range with similar Sooretama Slaty-Antshrike and is told from Variable Antshrike by paler gray plumage in males and richer rufous color in females.