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
Tawny piculet with white. In other regards, the sexes are similar; the cheeks and neck are tawny and the ear coverts brown. There is a slight white moustachial stripe and white streaking above and behind the eye. The throat is cream, and the breast and belly are yellowish-brown, sometimes with white streaking on the breast. The wings are brown and the upper tail blackish, except for the central feathers which are white. The beak and legs are grey and the iris rufous, with a greyish ring of bare skin round the eye. The tawny piculet is endemic to the Amazon rainforest of