Double-striped Thick-Knee

How to find it

Listen for the strident call at night, when the bird is more active and easier to find than by day. By day, scan open ground carefully for a motionless bird and check the shade of lone trees. Wet grassy swales anywhere in Guanacaste are safer spots, as is the Carara mangrove boat tour. At Palo Verde, a March trip report found the grass lawn in front of the reserve entrance centre a good place to look, and the access road to the Pan-American highway also gave good birding.

How to recognise it

Look for a large, upright bird about 50 cm long. The plain parallel marks are these:

Long legs and a big head.

Large yellow eyes.

A short, thick bill.

A broad black stripe beside the crown, under broad white eyebrows.

A white throat, grey chest and white belly.

Upperparts streaked brown and buff.

Juveniles look like adults but have slightly darker brown upperparts and a whitish nape. In flight the bird is striking, with a white patch on the dark upper wing and a white underwing with a black rear edge. That is very different from its hidden, camouflaged look on the ground.

What it sounds like

Recording: Juan Cruzado Cortés, CC BY 4.0, source, read 4 Nov 2026.

Behaviour and diet

It is mostly active at night, and its big eyes are an adaptation for that. It is usually seen in pairs.

By day it sits or stands motionless and relies on crouching and camouflage to hide. In bright midday sun it often crouches in shade and droops its upper eyelids, and it flies only reluctantly.

Across its range it feeds on insects and other small animals in lowland dry grasslands and arid savannas.

Where it lives

In Costa Rica it is said to be found in the dry forest and dry grassland of Guanacaste, in the northwest. It also turns up beyond that province: birders have seen it on the Tárcoles River beach, at Carara's mangrove boat tour, and in fields along the entrance road to Curú National Wildlife Refuge.

Across its range it lives from sea level up to about 1,000 m, in open dry country such as savannas, pastures, stubble fields, burned areas and scrubby woodland.

When to see it

Breeding has been recorded in early March in Costa Rica. A Palo Verde trip report calls February, in the dry season, a great time to visit, because the waters subside and birds gather.

Similar birds

It is the only member of the thick-knee family (Burhinidae) in the country, so no other Costa Rican bird is a close match. The long legs and neck, large eyes and short bill make it easy to identify right away. The adult head pattern, a strong white eyebrow with a black stripe above it, settles it.

Names and lore in Costa Rica

The official Costa Rican Spanish name is Alcaraván Americano, and people often shorten it to Alcaraván. Other Spanish names used elsewhere in its range include Alcaraván Venezolano and Búcaro.

Status and conservation

The AOCR list marks it as a resident (R), and BirdLife International lists the species as Least Concern.

Photography tips

It is mostly active at night, so look for it in open habitats such as savannas, pastures, stubble fields, burned areas and scrubby woodland. One birder driving back from Monteverde stopped for a thick-knee standing in the shade of a lone tree in a dried-out paddock, and said they would never have seen it had it been sitting.