[5] Its Spanish common name is cucarachero de pantano (literally, swamp cockroach hunter).

The juvenile's head is dark gray-brown with no supercilium, a buff nape, and less streaking on the back than the adult.

[3] The nominate Apolinar's wren is found in the Andes of Colombia's Cundinamarca and Boyacá Departments.

It favors páramo with the shrubs Diplostephium revolutum or Espeletia grandiflora and requires Chusquea tessellata dwarf bamboo for nesting.

[3] Apolinar's wren forages by climbing up vegetation stems and then dropping to near ground or water level.

The nominate appears to feed primarily on Chironomus midges but also spiders and other adult and larval insects.

[3] The nominate male's song is "a series of rising and falling churrs mixed with harsh gravelly notes" and it may have six or seven variations on it [1].

It is thought to be declining rapidly, owing to loss and degradation of its severely fragmented habitat.