Birds of the Atlantic Forest
Common potoo
Nyctibius griseusUrutau-comum
By day it isn't there. By night it still doesn't look like a bird.
- Habitat
- Forest edges, second growth and open woodland. A high, exposed perch.
- Season
- Summer visitor. Arrives in September and leaves in March or April.
- Size
- About 34 cm.
- We look for it on
- Through the Lens
By day it is a piece of wood. It perches upright on the tip of a broken stub, stretches its neck, points its bill at the sky and disappears: the plumage repeats the bark with an exactness that does not look accidental. Most people who walk past a potoo never see it.
At night it is another animal. It launches from a high perch, takes insects on the wing and returns to the same spot. Its eyes throw a torch beam back in burning red, and that ember in the dark is usually the first thing to appear. It builds no nest: it lays a single egg in a hollow on a branch and incubates it there.
What it sounds like
Bua · buá · buá · buá
Long, descending, almost human. It is the call that gave it the names it carries along the rivers: kakuy, ghost bird, old woman of the forest.
Where we look for it
Through the Lens
Birding outings at first light and after dark, in the locations the birder chooses.
Photo: Martino Esteche · © Natural Mystic Expeditions
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