Plumbeous Antbird

The plumbeous antbird is 17 to 18 cm (6.7 to 7.1 in) long and weighs 38 to 44 g (1.3 to 1.6 oz). Males are mostly dark slaty gray. Their wings and tail are blackish gray with white spots at the tips of the wing coverts. They have a large area of bare light blue skin around their eye. Females have dark slaty gray upperparts, wings, and tail like males. Their underparts are bright rufous with a brown tinge on their flanks and crissum.

The plumbeous antbird is found in the western Amazon Basin. It ranges from Caquetá Department in southern Colombia and Sucumbíos and Orellana provinces in northeastern Ecuador south through eastern Peru into northwestern Bolivia and east in Brazil to the basin of the Purus River. It inhabits the floor and understorey of evergreen forest. It favors the interior of várzea where tree falls create openings, but also occurs in transitional forest and along small watercourses and oxbow lakes. In elevation it reaches 500 m (1,600 ft) in Colombia and 300 m (1,000 ft) in Ecuador. It Peru it mostly occurs below 500 m (1,600 ft) but locally is found as high as 800 m (2,600 ft).

The plumbeous antbird's diet has not been detailed but is known to include insects, other arthropods, and snails. It forages as individuals, pairs, and small family groups and mostly within about 3 m (10 ft) of the ground and usually not with mixed-species feeding flocks. They hop along the ground and among low branches, and take prey mostly by picking from leaf litter and by reaching to leaves and twigs from the ground or a low perch. They occasionally attend army ant swarms to capture prey disturbed by the ants.