Pipra mentalis
Silhouette: Edwin Price · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~50% in a week ~80%
The red-capped manakin (Ceratopipra mentalis) is a species of bird in the family Pipridae. It is found in Belize, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Peru and Panama. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forest.
The red-capped manakin was formally described and illustrated in 1857 by the English zoologist Philip Sclater based on specimen collected by Auguste Sallé in Córdoba, Veracruz, southern Mexico. Sclater placed the species in the genus Pipra and coined the binomial name Pipra mentalis. The specific epithet mentalis is Latin meaning "pertaining to the chin".
The red-capped manakin was moved to the genus Ceratopipra when molecular phylogenetic studies found that Pipra was non-monophyletic. It is closely related to, and in eastern Panama sometimes hybridizes with, the golden-headed manakin.
Three subspecies are recognized subspecies: Ceratopipra mentalis mentalis (Sclater, PL, 1857) – southeast Mexico to east Costa Rica Ceratopipra mentalis ignifera (Bangs, 1901) – west Costa Rica and west Panama Ceratopipra mentalis minor (Hartert, 1898) – east Panama, west Colombia and northwest Ecuador Wikipedia →
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Panama City | 🇵🇦 Panama |
Possible
About 20% of wildlife watchers report a Red-capped Manakin sighting in Tikal National Park on a given day, based on 442 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 80th most-seen of the 300 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 50%, and over a week to about 80%, if each day is a fresh chance.
December and January
In those months about 30% of wildlife watchers report a Red-capped Manakin in Tikal National Park on a given day, against about 10% in June and July, the lowest months. Those are among Tikal National Park's driest months, with about 55 mm of rain a month against 190 mm in June.
Between 8 and 11 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Red-capped Manakin sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
8th of 28
Of the 28 parks where we can rate Red-capped Manakin sightings, Tikal National Park ranks 8th at about 20%. The best odds are in Pico Bonito National Park (Honduras, about 40%), Soberanía National Park (Panama, about 40%) and Cockscomb Basin Wildlife Sanctuary (Belize, about 30%). All parks ranked.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Red-capped Manakin is recorded against all the birds logged in Tikal National Park (442 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
