Golden-spotted Ground Dove

Metriopelia aymara (Prévost, 1840)

Golden-spotted Ground Dove, Metriopelia aymara, is a pigeon in the family Columbidae that breeds in south-central Peru, northern Chile, west-central Bolivia and Argentina. It lives in dry and semi-dry puna country in the Andes, using open plains, lake margins and grass tussocks, and it also gathers in Polylepis woodland and on rocky ground when nesting. Its closed wing carries a line of golden spots, with two dark patches and a dark band at the flight-feather tips. The eye is brown and, unlike others in its genus, lacks bare skin around it.

Order

Columbiformes

Family

Columbidae — Pigeons, Doves

Breeding range

South America: sc Peru to n Chile