Birds Guide

The large and diverse passerine bird family Pardalotidae includes the pardalotes, scrubwrens, thornbills, gerygones and allies. The family originated in Australasia and now includes about 70 species in 15 or 16 genera. Nearly all are confined to Australia (48 species) or New Guinea (about 20 species, including 6 found in both Australia and New Guinea). Only the gerygones extend further afield, with representatives in South-east Asia, New Zealand, and islands of the South Pacific.

All members are small to medium in size—some are very small—the majority are drab, inconspicuous, and often difficult to identify. All are mainly insectivorous, have 10 primaries (the tenth is vestigial in the pardalotes) and 9 secondaries (most having a vestigal tenth secondary).

One species, the Lord Howe Gerygone Gerygone insularis, is extinct; and 25 taxa in 17 species are considered endangered, three of them critically so. The primary threats are land clearing, overgrazing, degradation and fragmentation of habitat, and changing fire regimes.

The taxonomy of the Pardalotidae is complex and its classification has changed a great deal over the years. Recent microbiological work has made it clear that it is part of the Australasian corvid lineage, and it is most closely related to the honeyeaters and the fairy-wrens, all three families being regarded as part of the superfamily Meliphagoidea. (The Pardalotidae form the second-largest family of birds in Australasia, after the honeyeaters.)

At various times the Pardalotidae have been classified as Old World warblers, Old World babblers, and Old World flycatchers. The pardalotes themselves have been placed alone in their own family and grouped with the flowerpeckers. DNA studies suggest that the pardalotes may diverge sufficienty from the others in the group to justify regarding them as a separate family, in which case the remaining genera would be placed in the family Acanthizidae.

Species of Pardalotidae (part of the super-family Meliphagoidea)

• Subfamily Pardalotinae: pardalotes
  • Spotted Pardalote, Pardalotus punctatus
    Forty-spotted Pardalote, Pardalotus quadragintus
    Red-browed Pardalote, Pardalotus rubricatus
    Striated Pardalote, Pardalotus striatus
• Subfamily Dasyornithinae
  • Eastern Bristlebird, Dasyornis brachypterus
    Rufous Bristlebird, Dasyornis broadbenti
    Western Bristlebird, Dasyornis longirostris
    Pilotbird, Pcynoptilus floccosus
• Subfamily Acanthizinae
  • Rockwarbler, Origma solitaria
    Fernwren, Oreoscopus gutturalis
    Yellow-throated Scrubwren, Sericornis citreogularis
    White-browed Scrubwren, Sericornis frontalis
    Tasmanian Scrubwren, Sericornis humilis
    Atherton Scrubwren, Sericornis keri
    Large-billed Scrubwren, Sericornis magnirostris
    Tropical Scrubwren, Sericornis beccarii
    Scrubtit, Acanthornis magnus
    Chestnut-rumped Heathwren, Hylacola pyrrhopygia
    Shy Heathwren or Shy Hylacola, Hylacola cauta
    Striated Fieldwren, Calamanthus fuliginosus
    Rufous Fieldwren, Calamanthus campestris
    Redthroat, Pyrrholaemus brunneus
    Speckled Warbler, Chthonicola sagittata
    Weebill, Smicrornis brevirostris
    Brown Gerygone, Gerygone mouki
    Grey Warbler, Gerygone igata
    Chatham Island Warbler, Gerygone albofrontata
    Norfolk Island Gerygone, Gerygone modesta
    Dusky Gerygone, Gerygone tenebrosa
    Mangrove Gerygone, Gerygone levigaster
    Western Gerygone, Gerygone fusca
    Lord Howe Gerygone, Gerygone insularis Conservation status: Extinct (c.1930)
    Large-billed Gerygone, Gerygone magnirostris
    Green-backed Gerygone, Gerygone chloronotus
    Fairy Gerygone, Gerygone palpebrosa
    White-throated Gerygone, Gerygone olivacea
    Mountain Thornbill, Acanthiza katherina
    Brown Thornbill, Acanthiza pusilla
    Inland Thornbill, Acanthiza apicalis
    Tasmanian Thornbill, Acanthiza ewingii
    Chestnut-rumped Thornbill, Acanthiza uropygialis
    Slaty-backed Thornbill, Acanthiza robustirostris
    Western Thornbill, Acanthiza inornata
    Buff-rumped Thornbill, Acanthiza reguloides
    Slender-billed Thornbill, Acanthiza iredalei
    Yellow-rumped Thornbill, Acanthiza chrysorrhoa
    Yellow Thornbill, Acanthiza nana
    Striated Thornbill, Acanthiza lineata
    Southern Whiteface, Aphelocephala leucopsis
    Chestnut-breasted Whiteface, Aphelocephala pectoralis
    Banded Whiteface, Aphelocephala nigricincta

Further reading

• PJ Higgins & JM Peter (Eds.), Handbook of Australian, New Zealand & Antarctic Birds, Volume 6: Pardalotes to shrike-thrushes. Oxford, Melbourne, 2002: ISBN 0-19-553762-9