What bird nests in a burrow under the ground and helps to keep our forests healthy? The Spotted Pardalote, a very small songbird that spends most of its time high in a eucalypt canopy, so it is most often detected by its characteristic three-note call.
The wings, tail and head of the male are black and covered with small, distinct white spots with a pale eyebrow, a yellow throat and a reddish rump. Underparts are pale-buff cinnamon with a yellow throat. Females are similar but paler with less-distinct markings.
Spotted Pardalote are found along the east coast, south-east and south-west corner of Australia. Breeding pairs hold 1-4ha territories, mostly in eucalypt forests and woodlands. They can also be seen in parks and gardens, especially those with a well-established eucalypt canopy. They are an autumn/winter visitor to more open habitats, such as paddocks and grassland.
They forage in the canopy of trees looking for insects and sugary exudates from leaves and psyllid insects and their ‘lerps’, the crystal-like honeydew casing that the insect creates as a shelter for its body. Look out for Spotted Pardalotes flittering through the canopy of Blue Gums, Pink Gums or River Red Gums in search of these lerps, which are their favourite food.
Spotted Pardalotes are not just beautiful, they’re useful creatures too. Psyllids are plant lice that suck sap from eucalypts, which is fine on a healthy tree. But when under stress because of weeds, drought, logging or changed fire patterns, high numbers of psyllids can cause eucalypts to weaken and eventually die. So by eating lerps and psyllids, Spotted Pardalotes are playing their part to lessen the stress on native plants.
Breeding from June to January, the Spotted Pardalote is one of the few songbirds in the world that chooses to forego its ability to build a nest high up in the trees. Instead, parents diligently drill a narrow, circular tunnel into an earth bank, sandbank, creek bank or roadside verge.
The tunnels can run horizontally for up to 1.5 metres, at the end of which they excavate a nest chamber and line it with strips of bark and other soft materials. It’s in here that the Spotted Pardalote mother lays 3-5 eggs. From the outside, the burrow may just look like a little hole in the ground. Both parents share nest-building, incubation of the eggs and feeding of the young when they hatch.
Birds that nest underground risk a lot for their subterranean life as burrows can be easily accessed by snakes and other egg-eating reptiles and can cave in or collapse due to pressures on the surface.
BirdLife East Gippsland meets weekly for Monday morning outings. New members are always welcome.
