Slaty-backed Forest-Falcon

How to find it

The best plan, across its range, is to find a calling bird in the dark before dawn and then call it in. Even so, the species is hard to see in any country. Sites with large areas of Caribbean lowland rainforest are the more likely places. At La Selva, local guides often know of one or two roosting birds, and a tour group once saw an immature perched in the mid-canopy there. Trails on the Caribbean slope toward Fortuna are listed as possible, as is the southern Caribbean near Punta Uva and Paradise Road.

How to recognise it

Adults are slate gray above and white to cream below. The tail is dark with a white tip and thin white bars. The legs and facial skin are yellow.

The bird is about 40 to 45 cm long. Its legs and tail are relatively shorter than in other forest-falcons, which helps separate it from the Collared Forest-Falcon. Males measure about 41 cm and weigh about 420 g. Females are about 46 cm and 550 g.

Young birds look different from the clean slate-gray adults. They are browner above, with heavy dark scaling on the back and dark gray on the breast and flanks. Their pale underparts look scaly.

What it sounds like

Recording: Anthony Batista, CC BY 4.0, source, read 4 Nov 2026.

Behaviour and diet

Slaty-backed Forest-Falcons are solitary birds. Across the species' range they are active hunters that take birds, lizards and snakes, and one summary adds rodents, fish and sometimes bats. They hunt from the understorey to the mid-levels of the forest, sometimes on the ground, and may follow army ant swarms.

Where it lives

In Costa Rica it lives in lowland rainforest, and also in advanced secondary growth and selectively logged forest. It is a bird of the Caribbean lowlands, from the San Carlos and Tortuguero regions south to the Panama border.

Across its whole range it reaches about 500 m elevation but is mostly found below 200 m. It prefers undisturbed lowland rainforest and is often near streams or rivers.

When to see it

As far as is known it is a year-round resident across its range, though no best month or season for seeing it is known.

Similar birds

The Collared Forest-Falcon is larger, with a pale collar on the neck and a blackish back. The Semiplumbeous Hawk has a shorter tail and shorter legs, an orange cere and yellow eyes.

Names and lore in Costa Rica

The Costa Rican Spanish name is Halcón de monte dorsigrís. Other Spanish names listed for the species elsewhere include Halcón montés dorsigrís and Halcón-montés Pechiblanco (white-breasted).

Status and conservation

The AOCR lists it as a resident (R), uncommon or rare across most of its Costa Rican range, and Least Concern globally with a population thought to be decreasing.