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Keel-billed Motmot | Electron carinatum
Kielsnavelmotmot | Momoto pico quilla
The Keel-billed Motmot is a rare motmot of humid forest on the Caribbean side of Central America, from Belize and Guatemala to Costa Rica. The species occurs only in the guide area and is vulnerable owing to the loss of lowland and foothill forest. Its name refers to the broad bill with a raised ridge or keel.
Voice
A nasal, croaking kraa or kwaah, often repeated for long periods at intervals of a few seconds. Similar to the call of Broad-billed Motmot but harsher and somewhat lower.
Recording: Liliana Chavarria-Duriaux — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
30–35 cm, including the tail rackets. Largely green, slightly paler and more olive below. The forehead is rufous; a narrow turquoise line runs above the black mask. In the centre of the breast is a small black spot. The wings and tail are green to blue-green; the two central tail feathers end in a racket on a short stretch of bare shaft, but in worn plumage the rackets are sometimes missing. The bill is broad and flat with a distinct keel on the upper mandible. The sexes are alike.
Confusion species
Broad-billed Motmot Electron platyrhynchum has a rufous head, neck and breast, a turquoise chin and only the belly green; in Keel-billed Motmot only the forehead is rufous. The two species occur locally side by side in Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica. Momotus species such as Lesson's Motmot Momotus lessonii are larger, with a black crown ringed blue, a narrower bill and longer bare shafts. Turquoise-browed Motmot Eumomota superciliosa has a rufous back and belly and lives in drier, more open country.
Habitat
Humid lowland and foothill forest on the Caribbean side, up to about 1200 m; in Belize also seasonal forest on limestone. It lives in the middle tree layer and the upper understorey of closed forest, often in hilly terrain and along ravines. It sits still for long periods and now and then swings its tail. It nests in a self-dug tunnel in a bank, also in the wall of a pit or an upturned root plate.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
Caribbean side of Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and northern and central Costa Rica; the core of the population lies in Honduras and Costa Rica. In Mexico formerly known from southern Veracruz, Oaxaca, Tabasco and Campeche; there have been hardly any records there since the mid-twentieth century. Absent from Panama. Not present outside the guide area.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Known sites include the slopes of Pico Bonito near La Ceiba in Honduras and the Caribbean foothills around Arenal in Costa Rica. The nasal call is heard mainly in the early morning; a calling bird often sits remarkably still in the shade below the canopy.
Conservation status
Vulnerable. The population is small and highly fragmented and is declining through clearance of lowland and foothill forest. Possibly extinct in Mexico.
Scientific name
Electron carinatum | (Du Bus de Gisignies, B-AL, 1847)
Du Bus de Gisignies, B-AL described the species in 1847 as Prionites carinatus; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Electron was introduced in 1848 by Gistel. Electron is Greek ēlektron 'amber'; Gistel coined it in 1848 to replace a preoccupied name, without explanation, possibly after the plumage colour. carinatum is Latin for 'keeled', after the sharp ridge along the top of the bill. The specimen the first description was based on came from Guatemala.