White-throated Toucan Gallery

Ramphastos tucanus

The Birds of the World website offers these introductory words about the White-throated Toucan:  The loud, yelping calls of the White-throated Toucan are one of the most characteristic sounds of humid lowland forest in Amazonia, and can carry for a long distance. White-throated Toucans deliver their call with remarkable gusto, often jerking the bill and the tail upward with each yelp; these calls may be given in a duet, the calls of the female being at a higher pitch than those to the male. The toucans forage in forest canopy, and also enter adjacent tall second growth. The diet is typical of Ramphastos toucans: a mix of fruit, large arthropods, and small vertebrates (such as lizards, and the nestlings and eggs of smaller birds). The sexes are similar in appearance, but male is larger, with a bill that is even longer, relative to body size, than the bill of the female. The distribution of the White-throated Toucan completely overlaps that of a smaller species of toucan, the Channel-billed Toucan (Ramphastos vitellinus). In eastern Amazonia, these two species differ in the color of the breast and of the bill, but in western Amazonia the color patterns of the two species are almost identical. The smaller species is a member of the “croaking” group of toucans, with very different, frog-like vocalizations, and has a relatively smaller bill.

I saw and photographed my first White-throated Toucan on the morning of August 19, 2023 in the Amazon Basin Region of Brazil.  Our small group with Jeff Parker Tours was at Southwild’s Fazenda São Nicolau located on the Juruena River west of Alta Floresta.  That morning we were up early for a boat ride on the river when we spotted a couple of White-throated Toucans high up in a tree along the shore.  The next morning we saw the Toucans again, as we took a boat ride over to the ferry landing.  Fortunately I was able to some better photos during the second sighting on August 20, 2023.  For a more detailed description of these two sightings, look here at my blog post on my Brazil trip.  Here are some of my photos of this colorful and distinctive bird.