Designed by Paul Smith 2006. This website is copyrighted by law.
Material contained herewith may not be used without the prior written permission of FAUNA Paraguay.
Material on this page was provided by Paul Smith, Sylvia Qu, Matt Denton and Myriam Velázquez and is used with their permission.
TUFTED ANTSHRIKE Mackenziaena severa ATLANTIC FOREST
If you´ve ever been in the humid forests of eastern Paraguay the chances are you have been within a few feet of this species without ever seeing him. You´ve probably heard it too, but unless you familiarise yourself with his insistent whistling call then you will likely go on overlooking him. In fact only in the last few decades have ornithologists come to realise just how common this bird really is! Once they learnt his calls they began to find him everywhere, taking him from a rare, little known, much sought after species to a "Oh its just a Tufted Antshrike" in no time at all! Having said that its an impressive species, one of the largest of the antshrikes. The all-black males are much more often seen than the pretty females, thanks largely to their non-stop vocalisations.
Click on the images to enlarge them.
FIGURE 1 - (FPAVE2685PH) Adult male, PROCOSARA, PN San Rafael (Matt Denton October 2010).
FIGURE 2 - (FPAVE697PH) Adult male singing, PROCOSARA, PN San Rafael (Sylvia Qu June 2008).
FIGURE 3 - (FPAVE698PH) Adult male, PROCOSARA, PN San Rafael (Paul Smith February 2007).
FIGURE 4 - (FPAVE699PH) Same individual upperwing (Paul Smith February 2007).
FIGURE 5 - (FPAVE700PH) Adult female in moult, PROCOSARA, PN San Rafael (Paul Smith February 2007).
FIGURE 6 - (FPAVE701PH) Same individual upperwing (Paul Smith February 2007).
VIDEO - (FPAVE702VI) Adult male, PROCOSARA, PN San Rafael (Paul Smith October 2010).
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Mackenziaena severa
1 (FPAVE703RE) Song recorded PROCOSARA, PN San Rafael (Paul Smith March 2007).
2 (FPAVE704RE) Song variation recorded PROCOSARA, PN San Rafael (Paul Smith March 2007).
3 (FPAVE705RE) Downslurred whistle recorded Kaaguy Rorry, Departamento Caaguazú (Myriam Velázquez November 2002).
Click the link to hear the call. Longer versions of this call can be downloaded from the Paraguay page of our partner website www.xeno-canto.com - the largest collection of freely downloadable Neotropical bird calls available online.