The male has the crown of the head suffused with pearly-grey, but otherwise the plumage closely resembles the much more common snowy cotinga (Carpodectes nitidus), being pure white.

It occurs in a number of small, separate enclaves, the most northerly of which is in Costa Rica at the mouth of the Tárcoles River and in the Carara National Park nearby.

The males (and sometimes the females) perch high in trees by the Sierpe River and fly back and forth low over the water.

[1] The chief threat they face is the destruction of the mangrove forests in which they live for conversion of the land into shrimp ponds, pasture and rice cultivation.

Inland from the mangroves, much of the lowland forest has been felled and the construction of roads and dykes has changed the hydrology of the area.