Comb-crested Jacana
Irediparra gallinacea· 水雉科(4 photos)
Locations:
Comb-crested Jacana
20-26 cm. Female larger. Walks across floating plants on enormously long, dull green toes and claws; bill reddish, tipped black; pink-to-red comb on forehead; face and foreneck white, bordered yellow-buff; above a broad black breastband. Juvenile: comb small and pink; crown ginger-brown; no buff on foreneck or dark breastband. Singles, pairs, open companies on waterlily leaves and other floating aquatic-vegetation: active and often excitedly noisy, with much chasing. Walks with back-and-forward head movement: bobs head, flicks tail. Flies swiftly with quick shallow wingbeats, long legs and feet trailing. Swims; submerges to escape predators.
- Other name
- Lily-trotter; Lotusbird.
- Voice
- thin squeaky chitter or piping, often uttered in flight.
- Habitat
- floating vegetation of permanent, well-vegetated wetlands and dams; occasionally feeds along muddy wetland-margins.
- Breeding
- Dec.-April in n.; Sept.-Jan. in e. Aust.
- Nest
- low heap of wet, floating vegetation.
- Eggs
- 4; highly polished yellow-brown or red-brown, covered with maze of black lines. Adults may carry eggs/young under wings during transfer to new site.
- Range & Status
- coastal n. and e. Aust. from Kimberley (WA) to Hunter R. (NSW); well inland in parts, e.g. Mt Isa (Q); vagrant Mudgee, Sydney region and s. coast, NSW. Common n. Aust.; local and uncommon in s. Sedentary. Also se. Borneo to PNG, New Britain.
