Smoke-colored Pewee (Contopus fumigatus)

Identification & Behavior: ~17 cm (6.8 in). The Smoke-colored Pewee is uniformly dusky-gray. It shows a crest, and a mostly orange mandible and black culmen. It forages in semiopen areas and borders of forests where it perches on the tip of exposed branches and snags. It is larger than the very similar Blackish Pewee, which tends to perch closer to the ground.

Status: The Smoke-colored Pewee is uncommon in montane forests of the east and west (Piura and Cajamarca) slopes of the Andes at elevations ranging between 1000-2800 m. It also occurs in the humid and semideciduous forest of extreme northwest Peru in Tumbes. The Smoke-colored Pewee also occurs in Co, Ec, Br, and Bo.

Name in Spanish: Pibí Ahumado.

Sub-species: Smoke-colored Pewee (Contopus fumigatus ardosiacus), (Lafresnaye), 1844.  Colombia (except SW), extreme W & SW Venezuela, E Ecuador and E Peru.
(Contopus fumigatus zarumae), (Chapman), 1924.  SW Colombia and W Ecuador to NW Peru.
(Contopus fumigatus fumigatus), (d’Orbigny and Lafresnaye), 1837.  SE Peru and N Bolivia.

Meaning of Name: Contopus: Gr. kontos= pole, shaft and pous, podos= foot. fumigatus: L. fumus, fumi= smoke, fumigatus= smoked. Umigavi= to smoke.

See more of the Family Tyrannidae