Spangled Drongo
Spangled Drongo
29-32 cm. Bill black, robust, with prominent hairlike feathers at base; eye bright red. An often frantically active black bird with large head and longish 'fishtail' (temporarily reduced when moulting); head/back dull black, wings/tail more glossy; subtle glossy green spots on crown/neck/upperbreast. Immature: dull smoky black, with brown eye, scattered white spots on underwing, undertail-coverts. Singles, pairs, migratory parties or open companies to 100+. Noisy, pugnacious; sits motionless, shrugs shoulders, flicks tail, dashes into air in pursuit of insects (or small birds); forages on trunks/limbs and in foliage; feeds on blossom nectar. Birds display facing one another, sides of crown raised in curious crest shape, wings spread. Flight swift, swooping, erratic. Courting males fly up c. 30 m; dive with wings arched back, tail cocked, calling.
- Similar Species
- Koel, male: pale bill; rounded tail. Manucode. Metallic Starling: smaller, glossier with pointed tail. Black Butcherbird: larger, with hooked blue-grey bill, tipped black; dark eye; straight tail.
- Voice
- harsh chatterings - tearing 'shashashash' while perched and in flight; strange metallic notes, some like a tight fence-wire being twanged. Mimics.
- Habitat
- rainforest, mostly at edges; isolated leafy trees in farmland; eucalypt forests/woodlands, paperbarks, coastal scrubs, mangroves; leafy trees on watercourses; roadsides, parks, gardens.
- Breeding
- Sept.-March; may return annually to same site.
- Nest
- delicate, deep basket of twigs, vine tendrils, spiders' web; slung in horizontal fork in outer foliage, 10-20 m high.
- Eggs
- 3-5; pinkish or purplish white, blotched and with wavy streaks of pinkish red, brown, purple.
- Range & Status
- coastal n. and e. Aust. and coastal islands: from Kimberley (WA) through Top End (NT), s. to c. Katherine; e. to c. Oenpelli and NT Gulf Coast; e. Aust. from C. York Pen. (Q) coastally s. to Moruya-Batemans Bay (NSW); inland on Gt Divide to Carnarvon Ras. (Q)-Blue Mts (NSW). In NSW, s. to c. Macksville, it is a summer breeding migrant, arriving Sept.-Oct. to breed, many migrating n. through coastal Q in March-April, some crossing to PNG. S. of Macksville, it is a winter migrant, arriving c. March-April, departing c. Sept.-Oct. Casual e. Vic., w. to near Melbourne; vagrant n. Tas., SA, including Kangaroo I. Present all year in Kimberley (WA) and Top End (NT) (Blakers et al, 1984). Also Solomon Is., PNG, Indonesia to Malaysia and s. Asia.
- Distribution key to races
- 1. Dicrurus bracteatus carbonarius 2. Dicrurus bracteatus baileyi 3. Dicrurus bracteatus atrabectus 4. Dicrurus bracteatus bracteatus
