Lemon-rumped Tanager

Lemon-rumped Tanager - Doña Dora, km58, Valle Del Cauca, Colombia

Quick Facts

  • Scientific Name: Ramphocelus icteronotus
  • Spanish Name: Tangara lomilimón
  • Family: Thraupidae
  • Known Nicknames: Lemon-rumped Tanager, Yellow-rumped Tanager, Flame-rumped Tanager
  • Average Length: 16–18 cm / 6.3–7.1 in
  • Average Weight: 28–38 g / 1.0–1.3 oz
  • Wingspan: N/A
  • Key Feature: Male has velvety black body with a bright lemon-yellow rump and upper tail coverts
  • Primary Diet: Primarily Frugivore, also insects
  • Range: Pacific slope of Costa Rica and western Panama
  • Habitat: Humid lowland and foothill forest edges, secondary growth, and clearings
  • Social Structure: Social, often seen in pairs or small flocks
  • Nesting/Breeding: Open cup nests in bushes or trees
  • Conservation Status: Least Concern (LC)
  • Population Trend: Stable

The Lemon-rumped Tanager (*Ramphocelus icteronotus*) is a dazzling avian gem of the lowland forests and edges from Panama through western Colombia and Ecuador, instantly recognizable by its striking, high-contrast plumage. The male is a visual spectacle: a velvety, jet-black body sharply punctuated by a brilliant, glowing yellow rump, lower back, and undertail coverts, with a pale, silvery-blue bill that stands out against its dark face. A unique characteristic is the species’ vivid social behavior—they often travel in noisy, mixed-species flocks, their bright rumps flashing like beacons in the understory. Females are more subdued, with olive-brown upperparts and a muted yellow rump, but share the male’s distinctive, pale bill. Special features include their preference for foraging on fruits and insects at forest edges, and their role as key seed dispersers in their tropical ecosystems, making them both a visual delight and an ecological linchpin.

Fun Facts

Despite its name, the lemon-rumped tanager’s most flamboyant feature isn’t its yellow rump—males flash a brilliant, metallic-red throat and chest that looks almost wet with color, a trick of light refraction from microscopic feather structures. They are notorious for “anting,” a quirky behavior where they pick up ants and rub them through their feathers, using the insects’ formic acid as a natural insecticide and fungicide. This species also engages in “allopreening” between mates and even unrelated flock members, a social bonding ritual where they meticulously groom each other’s heads and necks, which is unusual among tanagers.

Habitats & Distribution

The Lemon-rumped Tanager is primarily found in lowland and foothill regions along the Pacific slope of Central America, ranging from southwestern Costa Rica through Panama and into the extreme northwestern corner of South America (western Colombia). Its preferred habitats include humid to semi-humid forest edges, secondary growth, clearings, and shrubby areas often near watercourses, as well as plantations and gardens. It avoids the interior of dense primary forest, instead thriving in disturbed, open, or transitional environments from sea level up to around 1,200 meters in elevation.

Behaviours & Reproduction

The Lemon-rumped Tanager is highly social, typically found in small, loose flocks of 3 to 10 individuals that forage together in the canopy. During the breeding season, which varies regionally but often coincides with the rainy season, males engage in elaborate courtship displays that include puffing their bright yellow rump feathers, bowing, and chasing females through the branches while singing a sharp, chattering song. Pairs form monogamous bonds for a single breeding cycle, though they may re-pair with different mates in subsequent seasons. The female alone builds a cup-shaped nest from moss, leaves, and spider webs, usually placed in a tree fork or dense shrub. She incubates a clutch of 2 to 3 pale blue eggs with dark speckles for about 12 to 14 days, while the male defends the territory and brings food to the nest. Both parents feed the chicks, which fledge after roughly 15 to 17 days. A unique reproductive strategy is their use of communal roosting sites outside of breeding season, where multiple adults gather, possibly to share information about food sources or predators.

Diet

The Lemon-rumped Tanager is primarily frugivorous, with a diet heavily centered on a variety of small, soft fruits and berries, such as those from melastomes, mistletoe, and figs. It supplements this fruit base with a significant amount of arthropods, including insects like beetles, caterpillars, and ants, as well as spiders, which it often gleans from foliage or catches in short, agile sallies. An interesting aspect of its feeding behavior is its tendency to forage in mixed-species flocks, often following army ant swarms alongside other tanagers and antbirds to capture insects flushed by the ants. Additionally, they have been observed visiting flowering trees to drink nectar, though this is a less common component of their diet compared to fruit and protein-rich prey.

Colors

The male Lemon-rumped Tanager has a velvety black body with a bright, lemon-yellow lower back and rump, and a white patch on the wing. The female is duller, mostly olive-brown above and pale yellow below, with a sooty-black bill that is pale blue-gray at the base. Its vivid yellow rump provides contrast against dark foliage, but it lacks specific camouflage adaptations, relying instead on canopy-dwelling behavior.