White-barred piculet different sub-populations of this bird on either side of the equator in South America. The northerly population is in Guyana, northwestern French Guiana and northern Brazil. The southern population is in southeastern Brazil, eastern Bolivia, eastern Paraguay and northern Argentina. The white-barred piculet occupies various habitats including wet and dry woodland, forest verges, thickets, gallery forests, wooded savannah, scrub, bamboo clumps, vines, creepers and overgrown parks and gardens at elevations of up to about . It is a resident, sedentary species. The white-barred piculet usually forages singly, but may join small mixed species flocks. It feeds on ants, their larvae
Varzea piculet is unlikely to be confused with any other piculet because it is the only species in its range with dark underparts. The varzea piculet is endemic to Brazil in tropical South America where it has a rather limited range. It lives along the Amazon River in a wildlife corridor, in the forest called "várzea forest", a freshwater swamp forest. It ranges from the confluence of the Amazon River with the Rio Negro in a , variable-width corridor downstream for about to the confluence of the Trombetas River from the north. The confluence of the Tapajós River joins here from the