Habitat
Eucalypt woodlands and forests, usually with a shrubby understorey or grassy ground cover or both. Usually in flocks of 2 - 12 and occasionally as many as 30, travelling between trees.
Varied Sittella (Daphoenositta chrysoptera) [XC98500]
by Greg McLachlan from Gulpa Forest, Deniliquin NSW, Australia (call)
Varied Sittella (Daphoenositta chrysoptera) [XC859840]
by id from Gluepot Reserve, South Australia, Australia (call)
Breeding Season (Guide)
July - December and March - April.
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Nest
Cup-shaped, composed of bark fiber matted with cobweb, decorated on the outside with small pieces of bark fastened like shingles, often forming an imitation of the bark of a tree in which the nest is buily, placed high in an upright forked limb of a dead branch.
Eggs (Guide)
2 or 3; dull bluish or greyish white, boldly blotched and spotted with greyish and reddish-brown and dusky slate, especially at the larger end; oval; about 17 x 14 mm. Incubation: 18 - 20 days; by female.
Young
Altricial, nidicolous. Fledge in about 13 - 19 days. Fed by both parents and helpers.
Subspecies
Described form albata, known only from 19th-century specimens from north-eastern Australia (eastern Queensland), considered an intergrade. Other proposed subspecies from Queensland include rothschildi (north-eastern area, south to Cairns) and magnirostris (Inkerman area), both synonymized with nominate, as also is lathami (from eastern Victoria); lumholtzi (Rockhampton area of eastern Queensland) is treated as a synonym of leucocephala.
The following 11 subspecies are recognised:
papuensis (Latham, 1801) - Mountains of Vogelkop Peninsula, in western New Guinea. Considered by some authors to be a distinct species, Papuan Sittella (Daphoenositta papuensis).
alba ( Rand, 1940) - Foya Mts, north of R Idenburg, in northern New Guinea. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Papuan Sittella (Daphoenositta papuensis).
intermedia ( Junge, 1952) - Western end of Snow Mts (Wissel Lakes area), in west-central New Guinea.
toxopeusi ( Rand, 1940) - Snow Mts, in west-central New Guinea. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Papuan Sittella (Daphoenositta papuensis).
wahgiensis ( Gyldenstolpe, 1955) - Central Highlands (Mt Hagen-Wahgi Valley), in east-central New Guinea.
albifrons ( E. P. Ramsay, 1883) - Mountains of south-eastern New Guinea. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Papuan Sittella (Daphoenositta papuensis).
leucoptera (Gould, 1840) - Central-northern Australia from north-eastern western Australia (Kimberley region) east to south-eastern head of Gulf of Carpentaria, south to Great Sandy Desert (in west) and about Tropic of Capricorn (in east).
pileata (Gould, 1838) - Central and southern western Australia (north to southern Great Sandy Desert) east through southern northern Territory and South Australia to far south-western Queensland, western New South Wales and north-western Victoria.
striata (Gould, 1869) - North-eastern Australia from Cape York south to R Burdekin, in north-central Queensland.
leucocephala (Gould, 1838) - Central-eastern Australia from R Burdekin south to Queensland-New South Wales border, and inland to Great Dividing Range.
chrysoptera (Latham, 1801) - South-eastern Australia from south-central Queensland south through eastern New South Wales and eastern Victoria.
The Field Guide to the Birds of Australia Pizzey, G., and Knight, E., 1997, Angus & Robertson, Sydney ISBN 0 207 19691 5
Field Guide to Australian Birds Morecombe, M., 2000, Steve Parish Publishing Pty Ltd. ISBN 1 876282 10 X
Field Guide to the Birds of Australia Simpson, K., and Day, N., 1999, 6th Edition, Viking ISBN 0 670 87918 5
Reader's Digest Complete Book of Australian Birds 1988, 2nd Edition, Reader's Digest ISBN 0 949819 99 9
What Bird is That? 1984, Revised Edition, Angus & Robertson, Sydney ISBN 0 207 14846 5
Handbook of Australian, New Zealand & Antarctic Birds 1990 - , Oxford University Press, Melbourne ISBN 0 19 553244 9
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