Nightingale Wren

How to find it

Listen first, because the song is how you will locate it. Seeing one can be done by calling it in or by tracking a singing bird with patience. Playback is technically illegal in official protected areas, so birders there must rely on patient waiting. Look low, in the darkest parts of the forest floor, and through small gaps in tangled shrubs. At Braulio Carrillo, a tour group heard one singing again and again near the start of a trail, and only the subgroup that walked back past its territory saw it. Expect only a few seconds of view.

How to recognise it

This is a tiny wren, 10 to 11.5 cm long. Adults are almost all dark brown, with a dark gray throat and breast.

The plumage looks scaly, with black scalloping on the back and wings. The bill and legs are black.

These marks describe the species in general. Its dark scaly plumage hides it against the forest floor, so expect a small dark shape that shows briefly through a gap in the tangles. The all dark look also helps separate it from the Scaly-breasted Wren.

What it sounds like

Recording: Dan MacNeal, CC BY 4.0, source, read 4 Nov 2026.

Behaviour and diet

The Nightingale Wren forages on or near the ground, in undergrowth, brush piles and on fallen logs. In Costa Rica it works the darkest parts of the forest floor, among fallen twigs under shrubs and tangles. While walking, it constantly beats its tail against the ground. It is a solitary bird that sings from low perches.

Costa Rican research on the Caribbean slope found the song is learned and changes over very short distances. Birds at the same site sang more alike than birds at different sites, across eight sites within about 23 km.

Where it lives

In Costa Rica it lives mainly on the Caribbean slope, in the foothills and the lowlands around them. On the Pacific side it is usually limited to ravines in humid forest. It is usually found up to about 1,200 m and occasionally reaches 1,400 m.

Across its range it prefers the interior of lowland tropical forest, especially undisturbed evergreen forest and the cloud forest next to it. The southernmost Costa Rican records are near the hills north of San Ramón and on the north side of Turrialba volcano.

When to see it

Breeding in Costa Rica is reported from about May or June to September. The nest and eggs are not known there, and no months are known when it is easiest to see, so its song is the way to find it.

Similar birds

It was once treated as a subspecies of the Scaly-breasted Wren (Soterré Silbador), which lives just to the south. The two were separated because their songs, plumage and measurements differ. In Costa Rica the two are often mixed up. The Scaly-breasted is a round, stub-tailed bird with a long bill, dull brown above with white underparts and fine black barring, and a ravine bird gives high, falling notes.

Names and lore in Costa Rica

Costa Ricans write the common name as Soterrey Ruiseñor, while the AOCR list gives Soterré Ruiseñor. Its close relative, the Scaly-breasted Wren, is listed as Soterré Silbador.

Status and conservation

The AOCR list marks it as a resident (R), and the IUCN rates the northern nightingale-wren as Least Concern.

Photography tips

Some birders have spent many minutes or even hours trying to see or photograph it without success. When it does show, the view lasts only a few seconds, and its dark scaly plumage hides it against the floor. Patience at a gap in the vegetation near a singing bird is the best approach.