Red-chested Buttonquail (Turnix pyrrhothorax)

Other Names (World)
Red-chested Buttonquail, Chestnut-breasted Buttonquail, Red-breasted Buttonquail, Chestnut-breasted Quail, Red-breasted Quail, Rufous-breasted Buttonquail, Yellow Buttonquail, Yellow Quail, Chestnut-breasted Turnix, Red-breasted Turnix, Yellow Turnix

Family
Turnicidae (Buttonquails)

Size
12 - 16 cm

First Described (Guide)
(Gould, 1841)

Derivation
Tur'-nix - L., quail: pyr-rho-thö'-rax - Gk, pyrrhos, fire-colored; Gk, thorax, chest

Habitat
Grasslands, in high dry country, river flats and in pasture and wheat stubble. From sea-level - 1,000 m.

Range (Guide)

Australia (B).

Image of Range of Red-chested Buttonquail

Northern and eastern Australia.

Population
Estimated population is unknown (2010).

Status LC
For more information see BirdLife International Species Factsheet.

Habits
Usually in pairs and small coveys.

Food
Seeds of grasses and other plants. Occasionally insects. Chicks are initially fed on insects and later on seeds.

Voice
A soft, quite high, booming 'oom, oom' repeated and rising though a sequence of calls.

Xeno-Canto Sound Files

Red-chested Buttonquail (Turnix pyrrhothorax) [XC687578]
by id from Nombinnie Nature Reserve, Euabalong, New South Wales, Australia (uncertain)

Nest
A slight depression in the ground, scantily lined with grass, placed in the shelter of a tuft of grass or other herbage.

Eggs (Guide)
Usually 4; matt, buff-white, thickly splotched with chestnut, purple-brown and slate-grey; pyriform; about 23 x 18 mm. Incubation: 13 - 14 days; by male.

Young
Precocial, nidifugous.

Subspecies
Usually regarded as monotypic, but recent proposal to treat Luzon Buttonquail (Turnix worcesteri) and Sumba Buttonquail (Turnix everetti) as subspecies of present species.

Proposed subspecies berneyi (north-western Australia) and intermedia (Queensland) no longer recognized, because based on individual rather than geographical variation.

No subspecies.

Similar Species
Little Buttonquail (Turnix velox) which is leass heavily marked above and lighter below and Red-backed Buttonquail (Turnix maculosus) which has a more rufous back.

References
See References.

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

Files:

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