Thicket Antpitta

How to find it

Listen first, then find a spot near a singing bird where you can see the ground and wait patiently. Scan the low undergrowth and forest floor for movement, and expect only a brief glimpse. Streamsides, forest edges and treefalls are good places to stand and wait. Birding the Peninsula Road or similar spots will probably let you hear it. At La Mariola it is heard almost daily around the cabins, river, trails, cacao area and denser vegetated edges, though it is hard to photograph. A tour group once heard it several times near Arenal but could not see it through the thick vegetation, so treat hearing it as a success.

How to recognise it

This is a small bird, about 14 cm long and around 44 g.

Look for these marks:

- very plump body

- almost no tail

- long, sturdy legs

- rich rufous flanks

- darker streaking on the breast

The rufous flanks and streaked breast tell it from other antpittas. Its Spanish name, Pechicanelo, points to that breast. Because it hides in thick vegetation, most views are brief glimpses of a low, half-hidden body, so the round shape on strong legs is often what you notice first.

What it sounds like

Recording: Tommy Andriollo, CC BY 4.0, source, read 4 Nov 2026.

Behaviour and diet

It hops on the ground in dense forest, edges and tangles, flicking through leaf litter for insects. It sometimes sings from a low perch but stays hidden. It eats mainly invertebrates and is sedentary, so it does not migrate.

A nest was studied in Volcán Arenal National Park, where an adult brooded two nestlings on 19 September 2012 and also fed its young arthropods.

Where it lives

In Costa Rica it lives on the Caribbean slope and is found only up to about 900 m. It lives in tropical moist lowland forest and in heavily degraded former forest, always in dense cover. It favors tangled thickets along streams and forest edges, and it loves wet, thick second growth. Inside mature forest it is generally found only where the forest is disturbed, such as along streams and at treefalls. It can occur anywhere in the Caribbean lowlands and may be most frequent in the Tilaran Mountains, mostly the Arenal area.

When to see it

It is most active at dawn and dusk, when calls are most frequent.

Similar birds

Costa Rica's only other lowland antpitta is the Streak-chested Antpitta, reliably found at Carara National Park on the Pacific side, where it gives a sad whistled song. The Thicket Antpitta was long treated as a subspecies of the White-lored Antpitta, and the combined species was called Fulvous-bellied Antpitta. The White-lored form lives in South America, so it does not overlap with Costa Rican birds.

Names and lore in Costa Rica

Costa Ricans call it Tororoi Pechicanelo, sometimes written toroide pechicanelo. Nicaragua uses Hormiguero Pechicanelo, Colombia uses Tororoi Buchifulvo, and Honduras uses Hormiguero panza ocre.

Status and conservation

The official Costa Rican list (2025-2026) gives it resident (R) status, it is described as fairly uncommon here, and the IUCN rates it Least Concern.

Photography tips

Photographing it takes patience. One photographer spent over an hour in the forest working out an angle on a close bird, with vegetation in front, little light and a half-hidden body. Mosquitoes and dim, patchy light make the waiting harder.