hunts from a perch like a shrike or flycatcher. It uses its wide mouth to capture insects such as flies and moths, but also ants, other hymenopterans, termites, grasshoppers, locusts and crickets. It has a unique tooth in its upper mandible to assist in foraging, but swallows its prey whole. Breeding The common potoo chooses a stump high to occupy. It normally chooses a branch stump as a nest, and adds no sort of decorative or insulative material. It ejects feces from its perch to keep the nest clean. If breeding, the potoo chooses a stump with a small divot where an egg can be laid. Common potoos are monogamous. After mating, the female lays a single white egg with lilac spots directly into the depression in a tree limb. Parents normally care for one egg at a time. The male and female alternate brooding the egg while the other forages for insects. They divide brooding time evenly. Potoos lay their eggs in December to begin their roughly 51-day nesting period, one of the longest nesting periods for birds their size. Young potoos hatch after about 33 days, using their egg tooth to break free and emerge as downy individuals with pale brown and white stripes. The hatchling is fed by regurgitation. Parents gradually decrease their presence in the nest with the juvenile as it matures. While the parents are away from the nest, the fledgling begins to feed on nearby flies and preen itself. Around 14 days old, the juvenile begins wing exercises, and takes gradual steps toward leaving the nest. It ventures out on several flights, then returns to the nest with its parents, before departing for good about 25 days after hatching. Juveniles display disruptive coloration like the adults, so they can also camouflage into a branch. Apart from flying away, chicks respond to disturbances in a similar manner to adults. Status The IUCN has assessed the common potoo as being of Least Concern. It has an extremely large range and a population of at least 500,000 mature individuals. However, the population is declining, probably due to habitat destruction. References Further reading ffrench, Richard; O'Neill, John Patton & Eckelberry, Don R. (1991): A guide to the birds of Trinidad and Tobago (2nd edition). Comstock Publishing, Ithaca, N.Y.. Hilty, Steven L. (2003): Birds of Venezuela. Christopher Helm, London. External links Common potoo videos, photos & sounds on the