From Opus

Lepidocolaptes affinis

Photo by SeanKP
Photo taken: Costa Rica.

Identification

21.5 cm. Spotted crown, olive brown upperparts with fine streaking on the upper back, a chestnut rump, wings and tail, and heavily streaked olive-brown underparts. The bill is slender and decurved. Young birds are duller with less distinct streaking and crown spots.

Spot-crowned Woodcreeper is very similar to Streak-headed Woodcreeper, Lepidocolaptes souleyetii, but is larger, has a spotted crown, and is the only woodcreeper found at high altitudes.

The call is a squeaky deeik and the song is a trill and rattle deeeeeeah hihihihihi.

Distribution

Central Mexico to northern Panama.

Taxonomy

Habitat

Mountains from 1000 m to the timberline in mossy forest and adjacent semi-open woodland and clearings.

Behaviour

It builds a leaf-lined nest in a tree cavity or old woodpecker or barbet hole, and lays 2 white eggs.

The diet includes spiders and insects; it creeps up trunks and extracting its prey from the bark or mosses. It will join mixed-species feeding flocks.

External Links