Clay-colored Thrush Life History

Habitat

Clay-colored Thrushes are birds of open forests, woodlands, forest edges, yards, gardens, and cultivated areas like orchards and coffee plantations. They generally do not occur in extensive undisturbed forests.

Food

Clay-colored Thrushes are opportunistic feeders, eating a mix of insects, earthworms, small lizards and snakes, and fruit. Like other Turdus thrushes, they forage on the ground, using their bill to turn over leaf litter in search of invertebrates. They forage in trees and shrubs as well, especially to consume fruit. Clay-colored Thrushes also take advantage of special feeding opportunities, catching aerial termites on the wing and attending army ant swarms to capture animals escaping the army ants.

Nesting

Nest Placement

Typically 1.5–3.5 meters (5–11 feet) up in a tree, but can be as high as 30 meters (98 feet). Also nests inside epiphytes, on windowsills, or inside open buildings.

Nest Description

A large cup nest with three layers: an outer layer that often contains moss and epiphytes, a middle layer consisting of hardened mud, and an inner lining of grasses, fibers, and roots.

Nesting Facts

Behavior

Clay-colored Thrushes typically occur alone or in pairs, but sometimes form small flocks at fruiting trees. When landing in a tree, this species spreads and closes its tail while flicking it up and down. Pairs are socially monogamous, but extra-pair copulations are common, resulting in clutches with mixed paternity. Female typically builds the nest alone and is solely responsible for incubation and brooding. Birds can be quite aggressive in defending a nest. Both parents feed the nestlings, which leave the nest after about 15 days and become fully independent about two weeks after fledging.

Conservation

Clay-colored Thrush is a common, widespread species. Partners in Flight estimates the global population size at 20 million breeding individuals and rates the species an 8 out of 20 on the Continental Concern Score, indicating a species of low conservation concern.

Credits

Garrigues, R. and R. Dean. (2007). Birds of Costa Rica. A Field Guide. Ithaca: Comstock/Cornell University Press.

Hilty, S. L., and W. L. Brown (1986). A Guide to the Birds of Colombia. Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, USA.

Howell, S. N. G., and S. Webb (1995). A Guide to the Birds of Mexico and Northern Central America. Oxford University Press, New York, New York, USA.

Panwar, P., A. Deshwal, R. Kannan, N. Collar, and A. J. Spencer (2023). Clay-colored Thrush (Turdus grayi), version 2.1. In Birds of the World (T. S. Schulenberg, B. K. Keeney, and S. M. Billerman, Editors). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.2173/bow.clcrob.02.1

Partners in Flight (2023). Avian Conservation Assessment Database, version 2023.

Stiles, F. G., and A. F. Skutch (1989). A Guide to the Birds of Costa Rica. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY, USA.

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