Rufous piculet creepers, bamboos and dead and rotting trees, often near streams. The rufous piculet is an active bird moving singly or in small groups through the lowest storeys of the forest, usually not above from the ground. It forages on trunks and dead branches, on vines, in bushes, among bamboos and in tall grasses. It gleans scrupulously, probing into holes and pulling out insects with its long tongue. It sometimes works its way up a trunk in a crosswise fashion, making little flights so as to turn to face the other way, the several members of a group often working in
Rufous piculet of bare skin around the eye. The legs and feet are yellowish or orange, and this piculet has just three toes on each foot, (four being normal in the woodpecker family). The juvenile is rather more grey. The rufous piculet is native to tropical southeastern Asia. Its range extends from southern Myanmar, through Thailand and the Malay Peninsula to the Greater Sunda Islands and Borneo. It is a resident and sedentary species, generally restricted to the lowlands and hills, but at altitudes of up to about in Borneo. Its typical habitat is dense humid secondary forests with tangled undergrowth, vines,