Best viewed large.
I found this young lady at Cheynes Beach, WA, Australia in December 2015.
This young lady is of the subspecies Malurus splendens splendens.
Known as the splendid wren or more colloquially in Western Australia as the blue wren, it is a passerine bird of the Maluridae family.
It is found across much of the Australian continent from central-western New South Wales and southwestern Queensland over to coastal Western Australia. It inhabits predominantly arid and semi-arid regions.
The habitat of the splendid fairywren ranges from forest to dry scrub, generally with ample vegetation for shelter. Unlike the eastern superb fairywren, it has not adapted well to human occupation of the landscape and has disappeared from some urbanised areas. The splendid fairywren mainly eats insects and supplements its diet with seeds.
Like other fairywrens, the splendid fairywren is notable for several peculiar behavioural characteristics; birds are socially monogamous and sexually promiscuous, meaning that although they form pairs between one male and one female, each partner will mate with other individuals and even assist in raising the young from such trysts. Male wrens pluck pink or purple petals and display them to females as part of a courtship display.
Malurus is a genus of 11 species of fairy-wren found in Australia, Indonesia and New Guinea.
Maluridae is a family of small, insectivorous passerine birds endemic to Australia and New Guinea. Commonly known as wrens, they are unrelated to the true wrens of the Northern Hemisphere. The family includes 15 species of fairywren, 3 emu-wrens, and 11 grasswrens.
The Maluridae are one of the many families to have emerged from the great corvid radiation in Australasia: Passerines peculiar to Australasia, descended from the crow family, and now occupying a vast range of roles and sizes; examples include wrens, robins, magpies, thornbills, pardalotes, the huge honeyeater family, treecreepers, lyrebirds, birds-of-paradise and bowerbirds.
Wikipedia
Posted by NigelJE on 2017-11-15 16:56:06
Tagged: , Splendid Fairywren , Splendid Wren , Blue Wren , Fairy-wren , Malurus splendens , Malurus , Maluridae , Malurus splendens splendens , NigelJE , Cheyne’s Beach , WA