The black-chinned honeyeater (Melithreptus gularis ) is a species of passerine bird in the family Meliphagidae. It is endemic to Australia. Two subspecies are recognised. Its natural habitats are temperate forests and subtropical or tropical dry forests.
In zoology, a nectarivore is an animal that derives its energy and nutrient requirements from a diet consisting mainly or exclusively of the sugar-...
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TerrestrialTerrestrial animals are animals that live predominantly or entirely on land (e.g., cats, ants, snails), as compared with aquatic animals, which liv...
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NomadicNomadic animals regularly move to and from the same areas within a well-defined range. Most animals travel in groups in search of better territorie...
Oviparous animals are female animals that lay their eggs, with little or no other embryonic development within the mother. This is the reproductive...
Flocking birds are those that tend to gather to forage or travel collectively. Avian flocks are typically associated with migration. Flocking also ...
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starts withA mid-sized honeyeater ranging from 14 to 16 cm (5.6–6.4 in) in length, it is olive-brown above and buff below, with a black head, nape and throat, with a bluish patch of bare skin over the eye and a white crescent-shaped patch on the nape. The legs and feet are orange. Juveniles have an all-over browner plumage. It makes a scratchy creep-creep-creep call, as well as a more musical one. Ford noted that individuals from southeastern Queensland northwards had more yellow-tinged upperparts and paler underparts; and that those of northeastern Queensland more matched the golden-backed subspecies, though the bare skin around their eyes remained aqua-blue.
The golden-backed subspecies differs by having a yellow nape and rump, green-yellow back, smaller black on chin, more grey-white than buff breast, white flanks and abdomen, lighter brown wings, green-edged rectrices, and yellow-green bare skin around the eyes.
The range of the black-chinned honeyeater is across northern Australia, from northwest Western Australia (including the Kimberley, Pilbara, Great Sandy and northern Gibson deserts), through the Top End and the Gulf Country to Cape York in Queensland, through central and eastern Queensland and into central New South Wales. It occurs east of the Great Divide in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales, but is rare further south and appears to have declined in the Sydney region. It is found across central and northern Victoria and into eastern South Australia. It is considered vulnerable in New South Wales and South Australia, although it is secure overall. It lives in open woodland and dry sclerophyll forest, often near watercourses.
The species is absent from savanna on the western edge of the Einasleigh Uplands, particularly around the Newcastle and Gregory Ranges.
Insects form the bulk of the diet, and like its close relatives, the brown-headed and strong-billed honeyeaters, the black-chinned honeyeater forages by probing in the bark of trunks and branches of trees.
Black-chinned honeyeaters may nest from July to December, breeding once or twice during this time. The nest is a thick-walled bowl of grasses and bits of bark, lined with softer plant material, hidden in the outer foliage of a tall tree, usually a eucalypt. One or (more commonly) two eggs are laid, 22 × 16 mm in size, and shiny, buff-pink, sparsely spotted with red-brown (more so on the larger end).