This is bird note.

It's a warm morning in the tropical rainforest.

You grab your binoculars and scan the thick canopy.

But you're not spotting any birds.

Just lots of green leaves and a tree stump.

Hold up. That tree stump isn't a tree stump at all. It's a bird. Common pottos are champions of camouflage. In the daytime, these nocturnal creatures perched perfectly still on branches. Heads pointed upward, bodies outstretched, and eyes closed down to tiny slits.

With their cryptic coloration of brown, splashes of gray, and black spots, it's hard to tell where the branch ends and the bird's body begins.

It's a wondrous adaptation to avoid predators.

Their birds more often heard than seen,

with a melodious but mournful song made at dawn, dusk, and by the light of the moon.

The song earned Potu's the name Poor Me One in Trinidad and Tobago.

At dus, common potus awaken and take flight. They use their large yellow orange eyes, long wings and wide mouth to sally from a perch and gulp down flying insects.

At the end of the night shift, Pottoos return to their branches to hide in plain sight

for another day. For Bird Note, I'm Joanne Ryan.