[3] The smooth-billed ani was described and illustrated in 1648 by the German naturalist Georg Marcgrave in his Historia Naturalis Brasiliae.

[5] In 1756 the Irish physician Patrick Browne used the name Crotophaga for the species in his The Civil and Natural History of Jamaica.

[7] Browne wrote that the smooth-billed anis "live chiefly upon ticks and other small vermin; and may be frequently seen jumping about all cows and oxen in the fields".

[6] When the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus updated his Systema Naturae for the tenth edition in 1758 he included the smooth-billed ani.

The nest, built communally by several pairs, is a deep cup lined with leaves and placed usually 2–6 m (6.6–19.7 ft) high in a tree.

The smooth-billed ani feeds on termites, large insects, other invertebrates[12] and even lizards, frogs, eggs and hatchlings of other birds, and fruit.