Celeus elegans
Silhouette: Pepe Reigada · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~30% in a week ~60%
The chestnut woodpecker (Celeus elegans) a species of bird in subfamily Picinae of the woodpecker family Picidae. It is found on Trinidad and in every mainland South American country except Argentina, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay.
Some studies have found that subspecies citreopygius and jumanus are more closely related to the blond-crested woodpecker (C. flavescens) than to the other chestnut woodpecker subspecies. They have at times been treated as one or two separate species, and their exact placement is not fully resolved. Several more subspecies have been proposed as divisions of the six, but all have been determined to be either indistinguishable from one of the six, an aberrant form of one of them, or a hybrid.
The chestnut woodpecker is about 26 to 32 cm (10 to 13 in) long. Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Brownsberg Nature Park | 🇸🇷 Suriname | |
| 2 | Amacayacu National Natural Park | 🇨🇴 Colombia | |
| 3 | Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve | 🇪🇨 Ecuador | |
| 4 | Yasuní National Park | 🇪🇨 Ecuador | |
| 5 | Tambopata National Reserve | 🇵🇪 Peru | |
| 6 | Manu National Park | 🇵🇪 Peru |
With luck
About 10% of wildlife watchers report a Chestnut Woodpecker sighting in Yasuní National Park on a given day, based on 377 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 136th most-seen of the 533 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 30%, and over a week to about 60%, if each day is a fresh chance.
May and October–November
In those months about 20% of wildlife watchers report a Chestnut Woodpecker in Yasuní National Park on a given day, against about 10% in June–September and December–April, the lowest months.
Between 7 and 10 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Chestnut Woodpecker sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
4th of 6
Of the 6 parks where we can rate Chestnut Woodpecker sightings, Yasuní National Park ranks 4th at about 10%. The best odds are in Brownsberg Nature Park (Suriname, about 20%), Amacayacu National Natural Park (Colombia, about 20%) and Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve (Ecuador, about 10%).
Same genus: Celeus
The closest relatives of the Chestnut Woodpecker that you can see in Yasuní National Park (genus Celeus, Neotropical Crested Woodpeckers) are Cream-colored Woodpecker (about 20%), Waved Woodpecker (about 10%) and Ringed Woodpecker (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Chestnut Woodpecker is recorded against all the birds logged in Yasuní National Park (377 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.
