The Story
I photographed this Speckled Chachalaca (Ortalis guttata) in the vereda El Pepino, outside Mocoa, Putumayo, Colombia. It lives across the Amazonian regions of Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru. Its diet has not been studied much but includes fruits and other plant material. One nest that was described was made entirely of leaves on a bed of dry ferns. It usually forages in small flocks of up to seven birds in the subcanopy and understory, rarely on the ground. IUCN lists it as Least Concern.
I made this frame with a Canon R5 and the RF 800mm f/11, at 1/500 sec, f/11, ISO 3200. Local residents built the trail to the Fin del Mundo waterfall and promoted forest conservation as an alternative to activities that once cleared more of the forest.
©2022 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