General

LeConte's Thrasher: Medium-sized thrasher with plain gray or gray-brown body with paler throat and rufous undertail feathers. Eyes are dark. Bill is long, decurved, and black. Tail is long and dark. Sexes are similar. Name changed in 2017 from Le Conte's Thrasher to LeConte's Thrasher.

Range and Habitat

LeConte's Thrasher: Resident in deserts of the southwestern states from southeastern California, the southern tip of Nevada, southwestern Utah, and western and central Arizona to northwestern Mexico and the Baja Peninsula. Found in open desert scrub, alkali desert scrub, and desert succulent scrub.

Breeding and Nesting

LeConte's Thrasher: Two to four blue green eggs with brown spots at larger end are laid in a bulky twig nest lined with feathers. Eggs are incubated for 15 days by both parents.

Foraging and Feeding

LeConte's Thrasher: Diet consists primarily of arthropods, including scorpions, spiders, beetles, grasshoppers, and caterpillars; occasionally eats seeds, small lizards, or other small vertebrates; forages on the ground and by digging with bill and feet, sometimes several inches deep into substrate.

Vocalization

LeConte's Thrasher: Song is a loud and musical warbling with infrequent repetition of phrases. Call is a rising "tweep" or "ch-reeip."

Similar Species

LeConte's Thrasher: California Thrasher is larger and darker.