All species › Passerines › Ovenbirds and woodcreepers › Mournful Long-tailed Woodcreeper
Mournful Long-tailed Woodcreeper | Deconychura pallida
Zuidelijke langstaartmuisspecht | Trepatroncos colilargo sureño | Arapaçu-rabudo-do-sul
The Mournful Long-tailed Woodcreeper is the long-tailed woodcreeper of the western and southern Amazon, including eastern Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and northern Bolivia. The three long-tailed woodcreepers were formerly treated as one species and are separated mainly by song. It lives inconspicuously in the interior of rainforest and foothill forest.
Voice
The song is a slow series of high, plaintive whistles that gradually descend, to which the English name refers. The call is a short, sharp cheet.
No recording with a suitable Creative Commons licence is available for this species yet.
Identification
19–21 cm, slender, with a thin, straight bill and a long, stiff, rufous tail. The upperparts are olive-brown, and the wings, rump and tail rufous. A narrow buff supercilium runs behind the eye. The throat is buff, and the crown and breast finely streaked buff on an olive-brown ground; the belly is plain. Males are slightly larger than females; otherwise the sexes are alike.
Confusion species
Spot-throated Woodcreeper Certhiasomus stictolaemus is smaller, with a shorter tail and a spotted rather than streaked throat. Wedge-billed Woodcreeper Glyphorynchus spirurus is much smaller, with a short, wedge-shaped bill. Olivaceous Woodcreeper Sittasomus griseicapillus has an unstreaked, greyish-olive head and breast. Plain-brown Woodcreeper Dendrocincla fuliginosa is larger and bulkier, without streaks. In the far east of Colombia Whistling Long-tailed Woodcreeper Deconychura longicauda may occur, which is identified mainly by song.
Habitat
The interior of humid terra firme rainforest and especially foothill and lower montane forest on the eastern slope of the Andes, from the lowlands to about 1500 m. It climbs trunks in the lower and middle levels and searches bark and moss for insects and spiders, often in mixed flocks. The nest is in a cavity or crevice 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: east of the Andes, in the foothills and the Amazon region. Ecuador: in the lowlands and foothills east of the Andes. Peru: in the Amazon basin and in the foothills of the eastern slope. Bolivia: in the north and in the foothills of the Yungas. Absent from the Galápagos. Outside the guide area in the western and southern Brazilian Amazon.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Follow mixed flocks in the interior of foothill forest on the eastern slope and watch for a slender, long-tailed woodcreeper climbing low on trunks. The descending, plaintive whistles are heard mainly in the early morning.
Conservation status
Least Concern. The species has a large range but is tied to the interior of undisturbed forest and disappears where forest is cleared or fragmented.
Scientific name
Deconychura pallida | Zimmer, 1929
Zimmer described the species in 1929 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Deconychura was introduced in 1891 by Cherrie. The genus name comes from Greek deka, 'ten', onux, 'claw', and oura, 'tail'. Cherrie believed the bird had ten tail feathers with stiff, projecting shaft tips; it was later shown to have twelve. The species name comes from Latin pallidus, 'pale'. The specimen the first description was based on came from Hyutanahan, Rio Purus, Amazonas, Brazil.