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Rondonia Warbling Antbird | Hypocnemis ochrogyna
Rondoniaorpheusmierkruiper | Hormiguero de Rondonia | Cantador-ocráceo
The Rondonia Warbling Antbird is the warbling antbird of southern Amazonian forest, reaching the guide area only in north-eastern Bolivia. The scientific name ochrogyna means 'ochre female' and refers to the strongly ochre underparts of the female. Pairs live in dense tangles in the understorey and sing in duet.
Voice
The male sings a series of clear whistles that become lower and hoarser; the female answers with a shorter series. The call is a rasping cher.
Recording: Jacob Wijpkema — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · xeno-canto
Identification
11–12 cm, small and compact, with a fairly short tail. The crown is black with white streaks, with a white supercilium and a black eyestripe. The mantle is streaked black and white, the rest of the upperparts olive-brown with a rufous rump. The wings are black with two white wingbars. In the male the throat and breast are whitish with black streaks and the flanks rufous. The female has ochre spots on the crown and largely warm ochre underparts.
Confusion species
Peruvian Warbling Antbird Hypocnemis peruviana lives further west; the female is less ochre below, and the song differs. Yellow-breasted Warbling Antbird Hypocnemis subflava is yellow below and lives in the Andean foothills. Spot-backed Antbird Hylophylax naevius has a spotted back and a shorter tail.
Habitat
Dense understorey, vine tangles and rank growth in humid lowland forest and semi-deciduous transitional forest, also at forest edges and in secondary forest, below about 600 m. It searches for insects and spiders among leaves and thin twigs, usually up to a few metres above the ground. Little is known about its breeding; the nest is presumably an open cup low in the vegetation, as in related species.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of the Andes and the west coast.
Range and movements
Colombia, Ecuador and Peru: absent. Bolivia: in the north-east, in Beni and northern Santa Cruz, including around the Serranía de Huanchaca. Absent from the Galápagos. Outside the guide area in southern Amazonian Brazil, in Rondônia and Mato Grosso.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Search forest edges and the understorey of lowland forest in north-eastern Santa Cruz, for example in Noel Kempff Mercado National Park. The duet in the early morning gives the pairs away.
Conservation status
Least Concern according to the most recent assessment. The range lies largely within the zone of heavy deforestation in southern Amazonia, and forest loss is the main threat.
Scientific name
Hypocnemis ochrogyna | Zimmer, 1932
Zimmer described the species in 1932 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Hypocnemis was introduced in 1847 by Cabanis. The genus name combines Greek hupo, 'somewhat like', and knēmis, 'leggings'. The species name comes from Greek ōkhros, 'ochre', and gunē, 'female', after the ochre-tinged female. The specimen the first description was based on came from Tapirapuã, Mato Grosso, Brazil.