Elaenia gigas
The Mottle-backed Elaenia, *Elaenia gigas*, is a distinctive and relatively large member of the tyrant flycatcher family (Tyrannidae), spanning 17.5-19 cm in length and weighing around 30-36 grams. Its common name aptly describes its most prominent field mark: olive-green upperparts with a unique dusky mottling or scaling on the back and wing coverts, created by darker feather centers and pale edges. A broken white eye-ring, two prominent pale wing-bars, and pale yellowish underparts with a w...
Found primarily in subtropical and tropical moist montane forests, often favoring forest edges and riparian zones near streams and rivers, typically at elevations between 500 and 2000 meters.
Primarily insectivorous, feeding on beetles, flies, ants, and grasshoppers, supplemented significantly by small fruits and berries, which it takes by plucking.
This diurnal flycatcher exhibits typical flycatcher foraging strategies, frequently sallying out from an exposed perch to snatch flying insects in mid-air (aerial hawking) or gleaning invertebrates from foliage. It is also known to consume small fruits, plucking them directly from branches. Mottl...
The Mottle-backed Elaenia is a resident species distributed across the Andean foothills and adjacent lowlands of South America. Its breeding and year-round range extends from southern Colombia, south through the eastern slopes of Ecuador and Peru, into Bolivia, and reaching extreme northwestern A...
Least Concern
- The Mottle-backed Elaenia is the largest species within the genus *Elaenia*, making it a giant among its smaller, often similarly plumaged relatives. - Its distinctive "mottled" back pattern is a crucial field mark, helping differentiate it from many other drab olive-green flycatchers in its ra...