The Story
I photographed this Speckled Chachalaca (Ortalis guttata) at the Posada Turística Dantayaco, near Mocoa, Putumayo, Colombia, in October 2019. It lives across Amazonian Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru, in low or open forest, thickets and riverside woods. Its throat and breast are dark brown with the white speckles that give it its name, and its eye sits in bare slate-blue skin. It mostly forages in small flocks of up to seven birds, in the subcanopy and understory. Its song is a rapid, rhythmic five-note phrase, ha-ga-GAA-gogok. IUCN lists it as Least Concern.
I made this frame with a Pentax K-1 and the HD Pentax-D FA 150-450mm f/4.5-5.6, at 1/200 sec, f/5.6, ISO 1600, +0.3 EV. Mocoa, the capital of Putumayo, was founded on September 29, 1563, by Captain Gonzalo H. de Avendaño.
©2020 Adam Rainoff Photographer
The bird
The Speckled Chachalaca (Ortalis guttata) belongs to the family Cracidae (Guans, Chachalacas, and Curassows) in the eBird/Clements taxonomy.
Source: eBird.org (opens in a new tab)
Conservation
Least Concern on the IUCN Red List (assessment published 2019). Source: IUCN Red List