White-eyed Foliage-gleaner - Automolus leucophthalmus

White-eyed Foliage-gleaner (Automolus leucophthalmus)

Santa Luzia do Itanhi, Sergipe, Brazil
March 2004

The White-eyed Foliage-gleaner is distributed down the east of Brazil and into adjacent areas of Paraguay and Argentina. It is found in the undergrowth of Atlantic Rain Forest and in secondary woodland often associated with bamboo.

It is a dark brown foliage-gleaner with rump and tail a bright cinnamon-rufous and with a contrasting white throat and a white eye. Because it can survive in secondary growth it is still quite widespread but this particular sub-species, A. l. lammi is becoming scarce as the few remnants of Atlantic Rain Forest in north-east Brazil continue under threat.

HBW indicates that the sub-species A. l. lammi is found in Paraíba and Pernambuco while the nominate sub-species A. l. leucophthalmus is found in eastern Bahia. Since we saw this bird in Sergipe, I wondered which it was even though I thought that I detected a tinge of yellow in the throat which would indicate A. l. lammi. Fortunately Jeremy Minns has recordings of this bird from Santa Luzia do Itanhi, a definite A. l. lammi from Murici, Alagoas, and a definite A. l. leucophthalmus from Boa Nova, Bahia. As HBW states: "Race lammi song slower and more grating"

It feeds on beetles and insects which it gleans from dead leaves and viny thickets and it is usually found as part of a mixed flock.

It builds its nest in a chamber at the end of a horizontal tunnel which it excavates itself in an earth bank.

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