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Collared Trogon | Trogon collaris
Gekraagde trogon | Trogón de collar | Surucuá-de-coleira
The Collared Trogon is one of the most widespread trogons of the Neotropics, with green upperparts, a white breast band and a red belly. In the guide area it lives both in the lowlands and on the Andean slopes, but is commonest in foothill and lower montane forest. Many subspecies are recognised across its range, differing mainly in the colour of the belly and tail.
Voice
The song consists of two or three soft, descending whistles, cow cow or kwa cowp-cowp, repeated at intervals. The call is a short, rattling chatter.
Recording: Cid Espínola — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · xeno-canto
Identification
25–26 cm. The male is glossy green on the head, breast and back, with a black face and throat and a yellow bill. A distinct white band separates the green breast from the red belly. The tail is green to bronzy green above and barred black and white below, with broad white tips. The female is brown on the head, breast and back, with a red belly, a narrow white breast band, a white spot in front of and behind the eye and a yellowish lower mandible; her undertail is grey with fine dark barring and white tips. Juveniles resemble the female.
Confusion species
Masked Trogon Trogon personatus has a more extensive black mask, finer barring on the undertail that looks grey, and on average lives higher; the two species overlap in the montane zone. Black-tailed Trogon Trogon melanurus is larger, with a dark, unbarred undertail and a red eye-ring. Blue-crowned Trogon Trogon curucui has a blue head and breast. West of the Andes, White-tailed Trogon Trogon chionurus and Ecuadorian Trogon Trogon mesurus have a white or dark undertail.
Habitat
Humid forest in the lowlands, foothills and lower montane zone, also forest edges and old secondary forest, from sea level to about 2200 m, commonest between 500 and 1800 m. It perches in the middle levels of the forest and sometimes joins mixed flocks. It eats insects and fruit, taken in a short sally. It nests in a cavity in rotten wood or a termite nest.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of the Andes and the west coast.
Range and movements
In Colombia on the Andean slopes, in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, in the Pacific lowlands and in Amazonia. In Ecuador on both sides of the Andes, in the lowlands and foothills. In Peru mainly on the eastern slope of the Andes and in the adjacent lowlands. In Bolivia on the eastern slope of the Andes and in the northern lowlands. Absent from the Galápagos. Outside the guide area from Mexico to Venezuela, the Guianas, Amazonian Brazil and the Atlantic Forest.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Along mountain roads through foothill and lower montane forest on the eastern slope of the Andes, where the bird often sits quietly in the middle levels. Listen for the soft, descending whistles, mainly in the morning.
Conservation status
Least Concern. The range is large, but the species is declining locally through deforestation.
Scientific name
Trogon collaris | Vieillot, 1817
Vieillot described the species in 1817 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Trogon was introduced in 1760 by Brisson. The genus name comes from Greek trōgōn, 'nibbling', from trōgō, 'to gnaw'; trogons gnaw out their nest holes in rotten wood. Collaris is Latin for 'of the neck' or 'collared', after the white breast band. The specimen the first description was based on came from Cayenne, French Guiana.