Scaled Woodcreeper

The scaled woodcreeper is 19 to 20 cm (7.5 to 7.9 in) long and weighs about 27 g (0.95 oz). It is a medium-sized woodcreeper with a slim, somewhat decurved bill. The sexes have the same plumage. Adults of the nominate subspecies have a dusky face with whitish streaks and a whitish supercilium that is often broken. Their crown is dark brown lightly spotted with buff. Their back is bright reddish brown and their rump, wings, and tail cinnamon-rufous. Their throat is whitish. Their breast and belly are dusky brown with bold, black-edged, whitish streaks. Their iris is reddish brown to brown and their legs and feet olive-gray to blackish. Their bill is horn-colored to pinkish with a darker maxilla. Subspecies L. s. wagleri is slightly smaller than the nominate, with brighter cinnamon-rufous upperparts, less contrast between crown and back, and more brownish underparts with dimmer dark edges to the streaks.

The nominate subspecies of the scaled woodcreeper is found in eastern and southeastern Brazil. It occurs south and east of the Rio São Francisco from central Bahia south to northern São Paulo. Subspecies L. s. wagleri is found in northeastern Brazil north of the Rio São Francisco in southern Piauí, western Bahia, and northern Minas Gerais. The scaled woodcreeper's two subspecies inhabit different landscapes. The nominate L. s. squamatus inhabits humid Atlantic Forest, especially montane evergreen forest and low elevation rainforest but also gallery forest at the western edge of its range. Subspecies L. s. wagleri inhabits drier landscapes including semi-deciduous and deciduous woodlands, caatinga, and gallery forest. Both subspecies occur at the edges and interior of primary forest and older secondary forest. In elevation the species ranges mostly from sea level to 1,600 m (5,200 ft) but is found occasionally as high as 2,000 m (6,600 ft).

The scaled woodcreeper's diet is not known in detail but appears to be mostly arthropods. It usually forages singly, occasionally in pairs, and often joins mixed-species feeding flocks. It hitches up trunks and along slim branches, mostly from the forest's mid-level to the canopy but sometimes lower.