Sooty-faced Finch

How to find it

It rarely goes far above ground level and is most often found by its voice, so listen in dense, damp understory. Look in ravines and along stream beds in humid forest within its elevation band. Watch the ground as well as the shrubs, because it hops and feeds low down. Follow any army ant swarm, since it joins them. Open mid-elevation spots such as La Paz Waterfall Gardens have given good views.

How to recognise it

Look for a medium-sized, dark and sturdy bird.

The crown and nape are brown. The face and throat are blackish-gray. A clear white stripe runs along the cheek. The back is olive green. The belly is yellow.

Males and females look alike. Young birds are mostly olive-brown above, with a pale yellow center to the belly, so they look duller than adults.

What it sounds like

Recording: Rajan Rao, CC BY 4.0, source, read 4 Nov 2026.

Behaviour and diet

It is usually seen in pairs or family groups. It hops heavily on the ground, flicks its wings and wags its tail, and it also checks low shrubs.

It eats seeds, berries, fallen fruit, spiders and insects. It follows army ant swarms and briefly joins mixed flocks of small understory birds.

A nest found in Costa Rica in May was a mossy dome with a side entrance, about 1.5 m above the ground on a fern.

Where it lives

The Sooty-faced Finch lives in the understory and dense low growth of deep ravines and stream beds in humid forest. It is locally common from about 600 to 1850 m on the Caribbean and southern Pacific slopes.

It is resident from the Cordillera de Tilarán south to Panama. A cut-off population was reported in the Dota region of the south Pacific.

Similar birds

It is very like the Olive Finch. The Sooty-faced Finch has a bold white cheek stripe and a yellow patch on the underparts, and those two marks separate the two species.

Names and lore in Costa Rica

The official Costa Rican Spanish name is Pinzón Barranquero. Other Spanish names listed for the species include Pinzón Tiznado, Pinzón Carisucio and Cerquero Carisucio.

The first specimen described to science came from a place called Barranca, Costa Rica. The old scientific names were Buarremon crassirostris and later Lysurus crassirostris.

Status and conservation

The official Costa Rican list marks it R-END, resident and regional endemic, and it is rated Least Concern for conservation.

Photography tips

A species that usually hides is hard to photograph. At La Paz Waterfall Gardens a bird was seen feeding on the ground under restaurant tables, which is a place to look for a close, open view.