All species › Passerines › Antbirds › Rufous-tailed Stipplethroat
Rufous-tailed Stipplethroat | Epinecrophylla erythrura
Roodstaartmiersluiper | Hormiguerito colirrufo | Choquinha-de-cauda-ruiva
The Rufous-tailed Stipplethroat is the largest Epinecrophylla in the guide area, with a rufous back and tail. It lives in the understorey of rainforest in the western Amazon and forages in dead leaves, usually with mixed flocks.
Voice
The song is a series of high, thin whistles falling quickly in pitch. The call is a dry chik.
Recording: Paul Coopmans — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · xeno-canto
Identification
12 cm, with a relatively long tail. The male is rufous above, with a more olive-brown head, a rufous tail and black wing coverts with buff spots. The throat is dark with white stippling, the breast grey and the flanks brownish. The female has a plain ochre throat and breast. The iris is dark.
Confusion species
Rufous-backed Stipplethroat Epinecrophylla haematonota is smaller and has a brown tail. Ornate Stipplethroat Epinecrophylla ornata has a grey head and underparts, white wing spots and a brown tail. Foothill Stipplethroat Epinecrophylla spodionota lives higher and has an olive-brown back and brown tail.
Habitat
Understorey of humid lowland terra firme rainforest and foothill forest, up to about 1000 m. It travels in pairs with understorey mixed flocks, searching hanging dead leaves for arthropods. The nest is a ball of dead leaves with a side entrance, low in the vegetation.
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 southeast. Ecuador: in the eastern lowlands and foothills. Peru: in the northern and central Amazon lowlands. Absent from Bolivia and the Galápagos. Outside the guide area in western Amazonian Brazil.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Follow understorey mixed flocks in terra firme forest in eastern Ecuador or northeastern Peru and look for an antwren with a rufous tail probing dead leaves.
Conservation status
Least Concern. Fairly common in undisturbed forest; sensitive to fragmentation.
Scientific name
Epinecrophylla erythrura | (Sclater, 1890)
Sclater described the species in 1890 as Myrmotherula erythrura; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Epinecrophylla was introduced in 2006 by Isler & Brumfield. The genus name combines Greek epi, 'on', nekros, 'dead', and phullon, 'leaf', for the habit of foraging in hanging dead leaves. The species name comes from Greek eruthros, 'red', and oura, 'tail', for the rufous tail. The specimen the first description was based on came from Río Napo, Ecuador.