Chestnut belted Gnateater (Conopophaga aurita)

[order] Passeriformes | [family] Conopophagidae | [latin] Conopophaga aurita | [UK] Chestnut-belted Gnateater | [FR] Conophage a oreilles blanches | [DE] Rostbrust-Muckenfresser | [ES] Jejenero Orejudo | [IT] Mangiamoscerini dalle redini | [NL] Cayenne-muggeneter

It is a small dark brown bird with a distinctive bright reddish-chestnut breast or upper breast. This is also contrasted with a deep black throat patch, combined with a deep black forehead and face patch; a narrow pure white upper eyestripe with short extended feathers is behind the eye and combines with its brown crown feathers and extends toward the upper back. It has a short mildly stout bill, and buff colored legs.

The range of the Chestnut-belted Gnateater is throughout the Amazon Basin, centered on the Amazon River. The following range limits are: it covers the entire downstream half of the regions in the south Basin and does not extend into Bolivia. The limits in the west are eastern and northeastern Peru with parts of northeast Ecuador and southern Colombia; the limit in this area in the west and northwest is the Rio Negro and the species is not found in the north central Amazon Basin of most of Brazil’s Roraima state.

The range in the northeast Basin beyond the Amazon River outlet extends through Amapa state into the Guianas to the Atlantic coast, and the central and eastern Guiana Shield to include only eastern Guyana.

Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests where it inhabits terra firme rain forests, preferentially in dense vegetation around fallen trees, where it lives alone or in pairs.

Nest is a cup made out of plant fibres on a large leaf just above the ground. Clutch size is 2 eggs.

Perching on low tree branches, it comes down to hunt for insects on the ground or in the foliage. Feeds mostly on anthropods.

This species has a large range, with an estimated global extent of occurrence of 3,300,000 km². The global population size has not been quantified, but the species is not believed to approach the thresholds for the population size criterion of the IUCN Red List (i.e., less than 10,000 mature individuals in conjunction with appropriate decline rates and subpopulation qualifiers), even though the species is described as ‘uncommon’ in at least parts of its range (Stotz et al. 1996). Global population trends have not been quantified, but the species is not believed to approach the thresholds for the population decline criterion of the IUCN Red List (i.e., declining more than 30% in ten years or three generations). For these reasons, the species is evaluated as Least Concern.

Sedentary throughout range.