All species › Passerines › Tyrant flycatchers and allies › Forest Elaenia
Forest Elaenia | Myiopagis gaimardii
Boselenia | Fiofío selvático | Maria-pechim
The Forest Elaenia is a small, olive-green tyrant of the canopy of lowland forest, mainly east of the Andes. It searches high in the trees for insects and frequently gives its sharp, two-syllabled call, also in the middle of the day. Like other Myiopagis elaenias it has a partly hidden crown patch.
Voice
A sharp, emphatic call, roughly pit-chew or chee-weet, repeated at intervals.
Recording: JAYRSON ARAUJO DE OLIVEIRA — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · xeno-canto
Identification
12.5 cm, with a rather slender bill with a pale base to the lower mandible. The crown is grey, with a white to yellowish-white, partly hidden crown patch; the lores and a narrow eye-ring are pale. The upperparts are olive-green. The wings are dark, with two yellowish wing bars and yellow edges to the secondaries. The throat is greyish white, the breast olive-grey with faint streaks, the belly pale yellow. The sexes are alike.
Confusion species
Greenish Elaenia Myiopagis viridicata lacks distinct wing bars, has a yellow crown patch and lives more in drier forest. Yellow-crowned Elaenia Myiopagis flavivertex has a darker crown with a yellow patch and lives in the understorey of flooded forest. The female Grey-headed Elaenia Myiopagis caniceps has blacker wings with sharper yellow wing bars. Foothill Elaenia Myiopagis olallai of the foothills is very similar; voice gives the clearest distinction. Yellow-crowned Tyrannulet Tyrannulus elatus is smaller, with a stubby bill and a grey face.
Habitat
The canopy and midstorey of humid terra firme lowland forest, flooded forest and forest edges, up to roughly 1100 m. It gleans insects from foliage, often in mixed flocks, and sometimes eats small berries. The nest is a shallow cup in a tree.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of the Andes and the west coast.
Range and movements
Colombia: in the lowlands east of the Andes and also in the north, in the Caribbean lowlands and the Magdalena valley. Ecuador: in the Amazonian lowlands. Peru: in the Amazonian lowlands and at the foot of the Andes. Bolivia: in the north and east. Absent from western Ecuador and the Galápagos. Outside the guide area from Panama and Venezuela to the Guianas and Brazil.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Listen in Amazonian forest, for example from a canopy tower or along a river, for the sharp call, and follow mixed flocks in the canopy.
Conservation status
Least Concern. The species also occurs in secondary forest and forest edges.
Scientific name
Myiopagis gaimardii | (d'Orbigny, ACVMD, 1840)
D'Orbigny, ACVMD described the species in 1840 as Muscicapara Gaimardii; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Myiopagis was introduced in 1888 by Salvin & Godman. The genus name comes from Greek muia, 'fly', and pagis, 'trap, snare'. The species name honours Joseph Paul Gaimard (1793–1858), French naval surgeon, naturalist and explorer. The specimen the first description was based on came from Yuracarés, Bolivia.