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Australasian Shoveler - BirdForum Opus

(Redirected from Australian Shoveler)
Male
Photo © by Tony Brown
Lake Monger, Perth, Australia

Alternative name: Australian Shoveler

Spatula rhynchotis

Identification

46-56cm

  • Long, spatulate bill

Male

Female
Photo © by Neil
Sydney,Australia, February 2004
  • Blue-grey head, with a vertical white crescent
  • Chestnut sides
  • Blue forewing
  • White underwing shows in flight

Female

  • Overall rufous-brown plumage, with darker streaks on upperparts
  • Buffish feather edges

Distribution

Australasia: found in south-western and south-eastern Australia including Tasmania, and New Zealand.

Eclipse of subspecies variegata
Photo © by the late Rookery
Cape Kidnappers, New Zealand, November 2008

Taxonomy

Formerly placed in the genus Anas.

Subspecies

Two subspecies are recognized[1].

  • S. r. rhynchotis
  • S. r. variegata

Some authorities treat this as a monotypic species[2].

Habitat

A wide variety of wetlands; prefers large permanent lakes or swamp that have abundant shrubbery cover of melaleuca and cumbungi.
Only an infrequent user of mangrove swamps, floodwaters, sewage farms.

Behaviour

Diet

The diet includes a wide variety of vegetable matter: herbs, grasses, pondweeds, wigeon grass, eelgrass, and algae.

Breeding

Seven or eight eggs are laid and incubated for 25-26 days; the young fledge after 40-45 days.

Gallery

Click on photo for larger image

References

  1. Clements, J. F., T. S. Schulenberg, M. J. Iliff, T. A. Fredericks, J. A. Gerbracht, D. Lepage, S. M. Billerman, B. L. Sullivan, and C. L. Wood. 2022. The eBird/Clements checklist of Birds of the World: v2022. Downloaded from https://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/download/
  2. Gill, F, D Donsker, and P Rasmussen (Eds). 2022. IOC World Bird List (v 12.2) DRAFT. Doi 10.14344/IOC.ML.12.2. http://www.worldbirdnames.org/
  3. Avibase
  4. Animal Bytes
  5. Birdforum Member observations

Recommended Citation

External Links

GSearch checked for 2020 platform.

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