Chiriqui Foliage-gleaner

Overview

The Chiriqui foliage-gleaner (Automolus exsertus) is a monotypic species of bird in the ovenbird family Furnariidae. It was recently elevated to full species status from its former classification as a subspecies due to significant differences in plumage and vocalisations.

Identification

• A fairly large bird, measuring 18 to 20 cm in length, with a heavy bill.
• Adults feature a dark brownish face with a bold buff eyering and faint reddish streaks on the ear coverts.
• Underparts include an ochraceous-buff throat, a breast streaked with medium brown and buff, and bright rufous undertail coverts.
• The song is described as a loud, harsh rattle lasting two to five seconds, repeated 10–30 times per minute, while the call is a nasal rack or hard tchehrr.

Habitat

Found on the Pacific slope from Costa Rica south of the dry northwest into western Panama as far as Veraguas Province. It inhabits tropical evergreen forest, mature secondary forest, and coffee plantations from sea level to 1,400 m.

Diet

Feeds mostly on a variety of insects, spiders, and vertebrates such as small lizards. It forages singly or in pairs, often joining mixed-species flocks, by acrobatically gleaning and pulling prey from epiphytes, debris, and clumps of dead leaves, or by flipping aside leaf litter on the ground.

Did you know?

This monogamous bird excavates a tunnel up to 0.75 m long in an earthen bank to construct a shallow cup nest made of leaf rachides at the end of the chamber.