Black-crowned Antpitta - BirdForum Opus

Alternative name: Michler's Antpitta

Photo by Birdingcraft
Quebrada Gonzalez, Braulio Carrillo National Park, Costa Rica, July 2008

Pittasoma michleri

Identification

18 - 19cm.

• Glossy black crown
• White lores
• Deep chestnut rest of face and ear-coverts
• Brown or olive-brown upperparts
• Fine white spots on wings, forming to indistinctive wing-bars
• White underparts with broad U-shaped black bars
• Brown eye
• zeldoni is larger, males have an almost black head, females are darker than nominate females.

Females are similar but with narrower black marks below. Juveniles are not described.

Distribution

Photo by Birding COLOMBIA Birding
Pirre, Darien, Panama, September 2014

Costa Rica, Panama, and northwest Colombia.
An uncommon and local restricted-range species.

Taxonomy

Subspecies

Two subspecies are recognized^[1]:

• P. m. zeledoni:

• Caribbean slope of Costa Rica and western Panama

• P. m. michleri:

• Eastern Panama and extreme north-western Colombia (Chocó)

Habitat

Very wet forest of Caribbean slope foothills. Occurs from lowlands up to 1000m.

Behaviour

Sticks to floor of dense forest making it very tough to see. Usually alone or in pairs.
Will sing from perch one metre above ground and frequents Echiton ant swarms.

Breeding

Breeding recorded in April and fledged juveniles in July. A single known nest was a thin cup made of fine dark rootlets and placed 1m above the ground in a low palm. It contained 2 eggs.

Diet

Little known, but have been reported as eating berries.

Movements

Probably a sedentary species.

References

1. Clements, J. F., T. S. Schulenberg, M. J. Iliff, D. Roberson, T. A. Fredericks, B. L. Sullivan, and C. L. Wood. 2014. The eBird/Clements checklist of birds of the world: Version 6.9., with updates to August 2014. Downloaded from http://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/download/
2. Del Hoyo, J, A Elliot, and D Christie, eds. 2003. Handbook of the Birds of the World. Volume 8: Broadbills to Tapaculos. Barcelona: Lynx Edicions. ISBN 978-8487334504

• List of references

Recommended Citation

• BirdForum Opus contributors. (2024) Black-crowned Antpitta. In: BirdForum, the forum for wild birds and birding. Retrieved 18 April 2024 from https://www.birdforum.net/opus/Black-crowned_Antpitta

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