Dusky Purpletuft / Zwartkapdwergcotinga

Dusky Purpletuft (Iodopleura fusca)

Pictures (click on them to enlarge)
female © Ton Plug	© Ton Plug	© Arjan Dwarshuis
male © Fred Pansa,, ecotours	© Sean Dilrosun, birdguide

The Dusky Purpletuft is a rarely seen bird in Suriname. It has a short tail, a dark cap and is white under its tail and in the middle of its belly. The male has some purple tufts under its wings. The bill is short and the bird eats berries. It resembles a bit the often seen Swallow-winged Puffbird. Ton Plug saw the Purpletuft in between Freds camp and the so called Fredberg in November 2016. About the 20th reported sighting in Suriname.
Dominiek Plouvier made a vidoe of this bird and the photo is a still from the video (July 2021)

Video (click the link or the 'play'-button to see)
Video recording of a Dusky Purpletuft © ;

Distribution

Each small square indicates the observation of at least one (group) of these birds, the medium ones at least four observations on different days and the largest ones ten or more. The color of each square indicates: blue for coastal area, yellow for savanna and red for rainforest.
Not all places in Suriname have been equally often visited by birders, so the distribution of the squares gives an indication of the whereabouts of the birds, but also of the birders. Some places deep in the south have no reported bird observations, by experienced birders, within 60 kilometer.

Abundance in different areas
coastal zone (blue dots on the map) :
northern savannas (yellow dots (in the north)) :
rainforest under 400 m (red dots) :
rainforest above 400 m (red dots) :
Sipaliwini savanna (yellow dots (in the south)) :
A blank is shown if not convincingly reported in the zone. Data interpreted by Arie Spaans, Otte Ottema and Jan Hein Ribot.

Names
Scientific name:	Iodopleura fusca
Order:	Passeriformes
Family:	Tityridae, 11 in Suriname
Dutch:	Zwartkapdwergcotinga
English:	Dusky Purpletuft
Sranan ('Surinamese'):
Guyana:
Papiamento:
Spanish (Venezuela):
Portugese (Brazil):
Arowak:
Carib:
French:

Observations through the year	Observations of breeding through the year

The 15 reported observations of this bird in Suriname, mainly for the last 50 years up to 2018, have been grouped by month. More birds on one day are counted as one observation. Of course, if the graph should depict the total number of birds seen, the differences between the months could be much more pronounced.	The reported breeding observations of this bird in Suriname. Most observations are about nest with eggs, some about fledglings, or feeding at a nest or the building of a nest. Of the about 5000 nests and eggs found for all species together, about 1/3 comes from the egg collection of Penard between 1896 and 1905. For some reason most collecting then was done in the first half of each year, so the shown distribution does not necessarily reflect the actual breeding preferences. The main dry season in Suriname is reckoned to be from half August to the end of November, the main wet season from half April to half August, but the the timing of begin and end does vary from year to year. Around March a second dry season often occurs.

Observations through the year

Observations of breeding through the year

The 15 reported observations of this bird in Suriname, mainly for the last 50 years up to 2018, have been grouped by month. More birds on one day are counted as one observation. Of course, if the graph should depict the total number of birds seen, the differences between the months could be much more pronounced.

The reported breeding observations of this bird in Suriname. Most observations are about nest with eggs, some about fledglings, or feeding at a nest or the building of a nest.

Of the about 5000 nests and eggs found for all species together, about 1/3 comes from the egg collection of Penard between 1896 and 1905. For some reason most collecting then was done in the first half of each year, so the shown distribution does not necessarily reflect the actual breeding preferences.
The main dry season in Suriname is reckoned to be from half August to the end of November, the main wet season from half April to half August, but the the timing of begin and end does vary from year to year. Around March a second dry season often occurs.

Last update: September 2024 by Jan Hein Ribot. Please mail your comments, photos to: jhribot ( residing at ) gmail (point!) com.
observations can be uploaded to suriname.observation.org or ebird.org ).