All species › Pigeons and doves › Doves and pigeons › Chiriqui Quail-Dove
Position in the tree Birds Aves › Birds with a flexible palate Neognathae › All other modern birds Neoaves › Doves, turacos and allies Columbaves › Doves and sandgrouse Columbimorphae
Chiriqui Quail-Dove | Zentrygon chiriquensis
Chiriquikwartelduif | Paloma perdiz de Chiriquí
Chiriqui Quail-Dove is the largest and heaviest quail-dove of Costa Rica and Panama, and a bird of middle-elevation montane forest. With its cinnamon-rufous face and underparts it is the most rufous of the montane quail-doves in the south of the guide area. Its name refers to the province of Chiriquí in western Panama.
Voice
A low, hollow, mournful call, woooo, first swelling and then fading, repeated for long periods at intervals of a few seconds. It is heard mainly in the early morning, from the ground or a low branch in the undergrowth.
Recording: Paul Driver — CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
29–32 cm; a large, heavy quail-dove with a short tail and reddish legs. The crown and nape are blue-grey, the face cinnamon-rufous, with a black moustachial stripe and a paler throat. The mantle and back are purplish chestnut, the wings and tail warm rufous-brown. The underparts are cinnamon-rufous to orange-brown, slightly greyer on the breast and paler towards the belly. Male and female are almost alike; juveniles are duller, with dark barring on the upperparts.
Confusion species
Buff-fronted Quail-Dove Zentrygon costaricensis lives mainly higher up and has an ochre forehead, a green-glossed hindneck, a grey breast and a buff face. Purplish-backed Quail-Dove Zentrygon lawrencii, lower on the Caribbean slope, has a white face, a grey breast and a purple mantle. Ruddy Quail-Dove Geotrygon montana is smaller, lacks the grey crown and has a pale cheek stripe with a dark stripe below it.
Habitat
Humid montane forest and cloud forest from about 700 to 2400 m, mainly between 1000 and 2000 m, with dense undergrowth, plenty of leaf litter and ravines; also in old secondary forest at the edge of larger forest. It forages on foot on the forest floor for seeds, fallen fruit and small invertebrates. The nest is a platform of twigs, low in shrubs or creepers.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
In the mountains of Costa Rica, from the Cordillera de Guanacaste and Cordillera de Tilarán through the Cordillera Central to the Talamanca range, on both slopes. In western Panama in Chiriquí, Bocas del Toro, the Comarca Ngäbe-Buglé and Veraguas, with a few records in western Coclé. The species does not occur outside the guide area.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Monteverde in the Cordillera de Tilarán and the forests around Volcán Barú near Boquete and Volcán in Chiriquí produce the most records; other sites include Tapantí and the Pacific slope of the Talamanca range. At a few lodges the species visits feeding stations on the forest floor.
Conservation status
Not threatened. Rather scarce but widespread in larger forests; outside protected areas vulnerable to the loss of montane forest.
Scientific name
Zentrygon chiriquensis | (Sclater, 1856)
Sclater described the species in 1856 as Geotrygon chiriquensis; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Zentrygon was introduced in 2013 by Banks, Weckstein, Remsen & Johnson. Zentrygon is a blend of the genera Zenaida and Geotrygon, reflecting these quail-doves' close relationship with Zenaida. chiriquensis means 'of Chiriquí', the province of western Panama where the species was described from. The specimen the first description was based on came from David, Chiriquí, Panama.