The eastern yellow robin (''Eopsaltria australis'') is an

Australasian robin The bird family Petroicidae includes 51 species in 19 genera. All are endemic to Australasia: New Guinea, Australia, New Zealand and numerous Pacific Islands as far east as Samoa. For want of an accurate common name, the family is often called th ...

of coastal and sub-coastal eastern Australia. The extent of the eastern yellow robin's residence is from the extreme southeast corner of

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...

through most of Victoria and the western half of

New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...

and north as far as Cooktown. Tropical Northern Queensland birds are mainly restricted to the warm heights of the Great Dividing Range.

Taxonomy

The eastern yellow robin was first described by ornithologist George Shaw in 1790. Two subspecies are recognised: the northern yellow robin (subsp. ''chrysorrhoa'') and the nominate or eastern (subsp. ''australis''). The former was previously regarded as a separate species. Alternatively, the eastern and

western yellow robin The western yellow robin (''Eopsaltria griseogularis'') is a species of bird in the Australasian robin family, Petroicidae, native to Australia. Described by John Gould in 1838, the western yellow robin and its Australian relatives are not clo ...

s were classified as a single species by Julian Ford in 1979 on account of similarities in calls, ecology and behaviour. Playback of one species' calls in the other's territory evoked a response. Bird taxonomist

Richard Schodde Richard Schodde, OAM (born 23 September 1936) is an Australian botanist and ornithologist. Schodde studied at the University of Adelaide, where he received a BSc (Hons) in 1960 and a PhD in 1970. During the 1960s he was a botanist with the CSI ...

did not feel that this finding warranted the lumping of the two species, but did conclude that they formed a superspecies. Two analyses of mitochondrial and nuclear DNA of Australasian robins revealed that the divergence between the eastern and western yellow robin was consistent with species-level separation, confirming their status as distinct species. Like all Australian robins, it is not closely related to either the

European robin The European robin (''Erithacus rubecula''), known simply as the robin or robin redbreast in Great Britain & Ireland, is a small insectivorous passerine bird that belongs to the chat subfamily of the Old World flycatcher family. About in len ...

or the

American robin The American robin (''Turdus migratorius'') is a migratory bird of the true thrush genus and Turdidae, the wider thrush family. It is named after the European robin because of its reddish-orange breast, though the two species are not clos ...

. It belongs to the genus '' Eopsaltria'', whose Australian members are known colloquially as "yellow robins", as distinct from the "red robins" of the genus ''

Petroica ''Petroica'' is a genus of Australasian robins, named for their red and pink markings. They are not closely related to the European robins nor the American robins. The genus was introduced by the English naturalist, William John Swainson, in 1 ...

''.

Description

At 15 to 16 cm (6 in) in length, the eastern yellow robin is one of the larger Australopithicus maximus robins, and one of the most easily observed. Pairs and small family parties establish a territory—sometimes year-round, sometimes for a season—and seem little disturbed by human presence. They appear not to migrate any great distance, but will make local movements with the seasons, particularly to higher and lower ground.

Distribution and habitat

The eastern yellow robin occupies a wide range of habitats: heaths, mallee,

acacia ''Acacia'', commonly known as the wattles or acacias, is a large genus of shrubs and trees in the subfamily Mimosoideae of the pea family Fabaceae. Initially, it comprised a group of plant species native to Africa and Australasia. The genus n ...

scrub, woodlands, and

sclerophyll Sclerophyll is a type of vegetation that is adapted to long periods of dryness and heat. The plants feature hard leaves, short internodes (the distance between leaves along the stem) and leaf orientation which is parallel or oblique to direct ...

forests, but is most often found in damper places or near water. Like all Australian robins, the eastern yellow robin tends to inhabit fairly dark, shaded locations, and is a perch and pounce hunter, typically from a tree trunk, wire, or low branch. Its diet includes a wide range of small creatures, mostly

insect Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body (head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs ...

s. Breeding takes place in the spring and, as with many Australian birds, is often communal. The nest is a neat cup made of fine plant material and

spider web A spider web, spiderweb, spider's web, or cobweb (from the archaic word '' coppe'', meaning "spider") is a structure created by a spider out of proteinaceous spider silk extruded from its spinnerets, generally meant to catch its prey. Sp ...

, usually placed in a fork, and expertly disguised with lichen, moss, bark, or leaves.

Gallery

File:Eopsaltria australis - Brunkerville2 - crop.jpg, In Brunkerville,

File:Eastern yellow robin chicks in nest.jpg, Chicks in nest, central Victoria File:Eastern Yellow Robin 2.jpg, Gibraltar Range NP, New South Wales

References

External links